A light lithium niobate transducer for the ultrasonic de-icing of wind turbine blades

This paper proposes a non-thermal method for wind turbine blade de-icing. A lead-free lithium niobate compound is based to fabricate a light ultrasonic transducer as such material has a high Curie temperature of 1210 degrees C, compared with the commonly used piezoelectric ceramics (PZT). The detail of fabricating the transducer is provided, which includes an examination of the critical properties of the material, construction of the transducer and harmonic analysis of the plate-ice layered model. Test results showed that the lithium niobate transducer can remove effectively the ice layer created in a freezer at -15 degrees C on the outer surface of wind turbine blade sample. In addition, the optimal frequency of ultrasonic de-icing for wind turbine blade is found to be at 442 kHz driven under 50 V, which is agreeable with theoretical analysis. (C) 2016 Published by Elsevier Ltd.