Method for protecting the surface of an aircraft against contamination with insect residues and/or icing

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9555901-B2
Application number	US-201013320842-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	May 18, 2010
Priority date	May 18, 2009
Publication date	Jan 31, 2017
Grant date	Jan 31, 2017

Abstract

A method of protecting a part of a surface of an aircraft against contamination with insect residues and/or against icing is described. The method includes the following steps:
a) coating the part of the surface to be protected with a coating that can, within a period of ≦3 hours from take-off of the aircraft and in normal flying conditions, reduce the adhesion to the part of the surface to be protected until detachment occurs on the basis of (i) temperature change and/or (ii) UV radiation and/or (iii) addition of a decomposing component and/or (iv) difference in air humidity, and b) exposing the part of the surface to be protected to (i) a temperature change and/or (ii) UV irradiation (iii) and/or addition of a decomposing component and/or (iv) a difference in air humidity, so that the coating together with any contaminants and/or icing thereon detaches.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. An aircraft with a coating on a part of its surface, wherein the coating is designed so that the coating, within a period of ≦3 hours from take-off of the aircraft and in normal flying conditions, reduces adhesion to the part of the surface to be protected until detachment occurs on the basis of (i) temperature change, wherein the temperature change is brought about at least partially by changes in environmental conditions due to a change in flying altitude after the aircraft takes off and the coating material is selected from the group consisting of polyurethane dispersions, acrylate dispersions, polyvinyl acetate dispersions and biological binders, (ii) UV radiation using a polymer that contains acid-labile groups in a main chain of a polymer and of photo-acids as initiators as the coating materials, (iii) addition of a decomposing component which is selected from a wetting addition of protein-degrading enzymes, acids and/or bases, and/or (iv) difference in air humidity, wherein the difference in air humidity is brought about at least partially by changes in environmental conditions due to a change in flying altitude after the aircraft takes off, and wherein a respective temporary layer of the coating is part of a system where the decomposition process is initiated owing to decreased air humidity at high altitudes, preferably because of the low humidity at the tropopause, the respective temporary layer becomes so brittle that there is a sufficient loss of adhesion.

2. The aircraft as claimed in claim 1 , comprising a device for applying the coating and/or a device for spraying the coating and/or an artificial UV light source for irradiating the coating.

3. The aircraft as claimed in claim 1 , wherein:
the surface has a laminar flow profile,
the coating comprises a temporary protective coating adhesively disposed on the laminar flow profile of the surface, and
the temporary protective coating is configured to, during flight, reduce adhesion to the surface and expose the laminar flow profile of the surface to air.

4. The aircraft of claim 3 , further comprising at least one of:
a first spraying device configured to apply the temporary protective coating;
an ultra-violet illumination source configured to irradiate the temporary protective coating during flight;
a second spraying device configured to apply a decomposing component to the temporary protective coating during flight; and
a heater configured to heat the temporary protective coating during flight.

5. The aircraft of claim 3 , wherein the temporary protective coating is configured:
to become brittle in response to lower temperature at increasing altitude, and
to break up after becoming brittle in response to high air friction during flight.

6. The aircraft of claim 3 , wherein the temporary protective coating is configured to protect the surface from at least one of: contaminants and icing.

7. The aircraft of claim 3 , wherein the temporary protective coating is configured to remove, during flight, any contaminants present on the surface when the temporary protective coating was applied.

8. An aircraft with a coating on a part of its surface, wherein the coating is designed so that the coating, within a period of ≦3 hours from take-off of the aircraft and in normal flying conditions, reduces adhesion to the part of the surface to be protected until detachment occurs on the basis of temperature change, wherein the temperature change is brought about at least partially by changes in environmental conditions due to a change in flying altitude after the aircraft takes off and the coating material is selected from the group consisting of polyurethane dispersions, acrylate dispersions, polyvinyl acetate dispersions and biological binders.

9. The aircraft of claim 8 , wherein the coating comprises a temporary layer configured to begin the decomposition process owing to the temperature change at high altitudes such that the respective temporary layer become sufficiently brittle so that there is a loss of adhesion.

Assignees

• Stenzel Volkmar
• Wilke Yvonne
• Schrübbers Steffen
• Hartwig Andreas
• Niedzwiedzki Georg
• Grünke Silke
• Airbus Operations Gmbh

Inventors

• Stenzel Volkmar
• Wilke Yvonne
• Schrübbers Steffen
• Hartwig Andreas
• Niedzwiedzki Georg
• Grünke Silke

Classifications

• C09D189/005

  Casein · CPC title

• C09D5/008

  Temporary coatings (C09D5/20 takes precedence) · CPC title

• C08K3/38

  Boron-containing compounds · CPC title

• B64F5/0018 Primary

  Operations & Transport · mapped topic

• C09D5/1656

  characterised by the film-forming substance (C09D5/1637 takes precedence) · CPC title