Icing on aircraft wings is one of the leading causes of aircraft crashes. It is mainly caused due to accumulation of ice or snow on the wing surface due to impact with supercooled droplets when passing through clouds at high altitudes, causing loss of lift obtained by the wings. It was found that droplet impact characteristics are dependent on droplet size, surface roughness, surface material hydrophobicity, and droplet impact velocity. As a continuation of the study of droplet impact contact characteristics by varying surface roughness and impact velocity, this study focuses on droplets impacting the vibrating surface at frequencies between 2-7 kHz. Atomization (water drop splitting into smaller droplets and ejecting from the surface) has been observed at different rates for all frequencies. The first set of data is collected by keeping roughness constant and increasing the amplitude of the vibration to observe the critical amplitude at which atomization is initiated. The surface roughness is varied for the second set of experiments. The data is quantified using image processing of the high-speed videos to obtain the rate of ejection for each case. / Master of Science / Icing on aircraft wings is among the leading causes of crashes, which involves small freezing water drops sticking to the wing surface thus reducing the lift. This study is an investigation to experimentally observe how small water droplets interact with surfaces vibrating at high frequencies when impacted. Surface roughness, materials, droplet velocities, and frequency of vibration have been varied and the droplet was captured using high-speed photography to study their effect on the aforementioned interaction. Glass, PET-G. and aluminum having specific roughness were fabricated using laser and chemical etching. Atomization (water drop splitting into smaller droplets and ejecting from the surface) has been observed at different rates for all frequencies. A relation between the amplitude of the vibration and the rate of atomization was found. The effect of varying frequencies and surface roughness has also been documented.

Statistical Energy Analysis (SEA) is one of the methods in literature to estimate high frequency vibrations. The inputs required for the SEA power balance equations are damping and coupling loss factors, input powers to the subsystems. In this study, the coupling loss factors are derived for two and three plates joined with a stiffener system. Simple formulas given in the literature for coupling loss factors of basic junctions are not used and the factors are calculated from the expressions derived in this study. The stiffener is modelled as line mass, Euler beam, and open section channel having double and triple coupling. Plate is modelled as Kirchoff plate. In the classical SEA approach the joint beam is modelled as another subsystem. In this study, the beam is not a separate subsystem but is used as the characteristics of the joint and to calculate the coupling loss factor between coupled plates. Sensitivity of coupling loss factors to system parameters is studied for different beam approaches. The derived coupling loss factors and input powers are used to calculate the subsystem energies by SEA. The last plate is joined to the first one to simulate the fuselage structure. A plate representing floor structure and acoustic volume are also added. The different modelling types are assessed by applying pressure wave excitation. It is shown that deriving the parameters as given in this study increases the efficiency of the SEA method.