Liquid anti-contamination systems for hybrid laminar flow control aircraft—a review of the critical issues and important experimental results

Abstract

Contamination of the aircraft leading edges by insects and other airborne particles is a major operational concern for the implementation of hybrid laminar flow control (HLFC)-an active drag reduction technique, which has the potential to produce significant fuel savings for airliners. A review of the critical issues is provided, encompassing the transition mechanism, insect distributions and concepts for contamination mitigation. The use of liquid/foam-based systems has proved to be very successful, as is evident in the review of experimental work.