Detection of Aircraft wing icing and de-icing by optical fiber sensing with FBG array

Aircraft wing icing is a significant threat to the safety of flight operations. This paper presents a novel method for detecting icing condition on the wing and monitoring temperature during the thermal de-icing process. The approach is based on distributed vibration and temperature measurements of wing using an optical fiber distributed acoustic sensing system with Fiber Bragg Gratings array. We utilize optical fiber sensors to monitor the changes in resonance frequency of the wing to detect the icing condition. Moreover, the sensing system is capable of simultaneously monitoring temperature with high precision by employing reference sensors to capture phase noise induced by laser frequency drift. Experimental results confirm the sensing system’s capability for simultaneous, distributed measurements of temperature and vibration. Additionally, the icing and de-icing monitoring experiments in the ice wind tunnel demonstrates the feasibility of the proposed icing detection method. • A measurement method of wing icing detection by FBG array sensor. • Experimental verification of the mapping of the ice layer changes to vibration frequency caused by wing icing. • An optical fiber sensing system for vibration and temperature simultaneously monitoring.