Cold Regions Science and Technology 146 (2018) 81–86

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Cold Regions Science and Technology

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/coldregions

An atmospheric ice empirical failure criterion T

a,⁎ a a b
H. Farid , A. Saeidi , M. Farzaneh , F. Erchiqui
a
Canada Research Chair on Atmospheric Icing Engineering of Power Networks (INGIVRE), University of Quebec in Chicoutimi, Qc, Canada1
b
Laboratoire de Bioplasturig et Nanotechnologie, Université du Québec en Abitibi-Témiscamingue, Rouyn-Noranda, Québec, Canada

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Characterizing the compressive strength of atmospheric ice is very significant to understand the ice shedding
Atmospheric ice phenomenon. For this purpose, several tests were carried out in order to study the behavior of atmospheric ice
Brittle failure under compression and tension, and under different experimental conditions.
Ice shedding Ice was accumulated in a closed loop wind tunnel in order to simulate the natural processes of atmospheric
Empirical failure criterion
icing. Four temperatures were considered (−20, −15, −10 and −5 °C), the wind speed inside the tunnel was
set to 20 m/s in order to obtain a mean volume droplet diameter of 40 μm, and a water liquid content of 2.5 g/
m3.
An empirical failure criterion for the atmospheric ice was proposed based on the experimental observations,
taking into account the porosity, strain rate and temperature.

1. Introduction by Schulson (Schulson, 2001) or recently by Farid et al. (Farid et al.,

Atmospheric icing of structures is a phenomenon that affects human
activities on many levels, and causes damages of different nature
(Farzaneh, 2008). This phenomenon is manifested by a deposition of
water drops or snowflakes on a cold surface (Farzaneh, 2000; Farzaneh,
2009). Structures in northern environments are often exposed to at-
mospheric icing. Wet snow, freezing rain, freezing fog, or hoarfrost are
some of meteorological events resulting from atmospheric icing. Al-
though the dangers caused by ice accretion on structures are con-
siderable, ice shedding is particularly important. Ice shedding, which
corresponds to the weight reduction of accumulated ice on a surface, is
the source of several structural instabilities on overhead power line
networks (Farzaneh, 2009)–(Fuheng & Shixiong, 1988). Understanding
this phenomenon requires a deep knowledge of the structural and
rheological properties of atmospheric ice.
Unlike other types of ice such as fresh water ice or sea ice (Michel,
1978), few works on the mechanical properties of atmospheric ice are
reported in the literature (Eskandarian, 2005)–(Druez et al., 1986).
These contributions concern the study of the rheological characteristics
of this type of ice, rather than providing quantification to its failure
limits. Therefore, a presentation of failure criteria seems to be indis-
pensable to understand the ice shedding phenomenon.
The presentation of ice failure criteria was generally based on ap-
proaches concerning brittle materials, such as the maximum normal
stress criterion (Schulson, 2001), the Mohr Coulomb criterion presented
2017), the criterion of the maximum strain suggested by Hamza
(Hamza, 1984), the strain energy criterion proposed by Cole (Cole,
1988), or the fracture toughness criterion for columnar grained ice S2
presented by Dempsey et al. (Dempsey & Wei, 1989). The failure of
atmospheric ice involves many parameters that should be taken into
account, this is more suggestive to the development of an empirical
failure criterion specific to atmospheric ice.
The compressive and tensile strength of atmospheric ice are con-
sidered to be the most significant properties for ice engineering, espe-
cially for the understanding of ice shedding mechanisms. These prop-
erties are highly affected by many environmental and structural
parameters such as strain rate, temperature, wind speed, porosity, li-
quid water content, etc. (Kermani et al., 2007). Consequently, as
compressive and tensile strength give a global image of the resistance of
ice to different loads, they must be taken into account when considering
the failure criterion.
The present contribution concerns the development of an empirical
failure criterion for atmospheric ice, which takes into account porosity,
strain rate, and temperature effects. A significant correlation between
the actual strength values and those predicted by the model was ob-
served. The proposed criterion was validated in the case of compressive
and tensile loadings.

⁎
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: hicham.farid1@uqac.ca (H. Farid).
1
www.cigele.ca.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.coldregions.2017.11.013
Received 11 April 2016; Received in revised form 29 October 2017; Accepted 20 November 2017
Available online 22 November 2017
0165-232X/ © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
H. Farid et al.
2. Experimental procedure
2.1. Atmospheric ice preparation
The technique adopted to prepare atmospheric ice has an aim to
reproduce the natural atmospheric icing process, specific conditions to
generate this process were created in the atmospheric icing research
wind tunnel at CIGELE Laboratories (Eskandarian, 2005; Kermani,
2007). Although the process has been detailed in a previous work by the
same authors (Farid et al., 2016), explanation of the experimental
procedure and setup seems important for the sake of clarity.
Three independent supply lines provided air and water to the noz-
zles. Distilled water was injected into a cold airstream through nozzles
located at the trailing edge of a spray bar. Air speed, water and air flux,
all were controlled to generate droplets with a mean volume droplet
diameter (MVD) of 40 μm and a liquid water content (LWC) of 2.5 g/
m3. A computer program allowed the control of these different para-
meters. Atmospheric ice was accumulated on a rotating aluminum cy-
linder (78-mm diameter and 590-mm length) making 1 rpm making the
thickness distribution of ice uniform. The cylinder was carefully
cleaned with hot water and soap before each set of experiment. Then it
was placed at the middle of the test section of the wind tunnel. The
distance between the cylinder and spray nozzles was large enough for
the droplets to reach kinetic and thermodynamic equilibria.
The time needed to grow a sufficient thickness of ice on the cylinder
varied depending on accumulation conditions such as air temperature,
velocity and liquid water content, it ranges from 2 to 4 h, sometimes up
to 8 h. The atmospheric ice specimens were prepared at four different
temperatures: − 20, −15, −10, and − 5 °C.
The specimen orientation according to the accumulated ice is illu-
strated in Fig. 1. Once a thickness of about 60 mm was obtained,
prismatic blocks were cut using a warm aluminum blade in order to
avoid any mechanical stress. Then, the blocks were machined into cy-
lindrical shape with a diameter of 40 mm and a length of 100 mm.
These specimen dimensions were adopted in order to avoid any influ-
ence of the grain size on the compressive behavior of the ice (Schwarz
et al., 1981).
Before each test, the ice specimen ends were cleaned and smoothed
to assure their parallelism. The specimen were fixed against the stain-
less steel platen using a thin piece of paper, the use of paper relax the
triaxial stress field in the end of the specimen, and allowed to the test
system to transfer the axial load perfectly.
Once prepared, cylindrical specimens have been tested on uniaxial
compression at the same temperature at which they have been accu-
mulated. As strain rate in natural ice shedding is not more than
10− 2 s− 1 (Kermani et al., 2007), hence, four strain rates were chosen
for the experimental tests: 10− 4 s− 1, 10− 3 s− 1, 10− 2 s− 1 and
10− 1 s− 1. The considered strain rates were calculated by dividing the
test system cross head speed by the sample's length. The test system is
considered infinitely stiff, so the system's compliance was negligible
during the compressive tests (Farid et al., 2016).
Ice specimen
Aluminum cylinder
Atmospheric ice
Fig. 1. Schematic illustration of accumulated atmospheric ice and the specimen cut.
82
Cold Regions Science and Technology 146 (2018) 81–86
0.016
0.014
0.012
Strain (%)
0.01
0.008
0.006
0.004
0.002
0
0 50 100 150 200
Time (s)
Fig. 2. Strain-time plot for a strain rate of 10− 4 s− 1 at a temperature of − 5 °C.
Plotting the strain versus time validated the claim that the specimen
strain rates were constant during tests, this is shown in Fig. 2 below.
In order to assure the results reproducibility, each test was repeated
a minimum of five time, more details about the presented results are
available in (Farid et al., 2016).
2.2. Microstructure observation and porosity evaluation
Compared to other types of ice, atmospheric ice shows relatively
high porosity and lower densities depending on the type of the accre-
tion regime. In the present study, a Micro CT (Computed Tomography)
has been used to quantify, with better accuracy, the porosity in the
prepared samples (Farid et al., 2016).
Based on the binary images presented in Fig. 3, one can note the
influence of the accumulation temperature on the porosity, as tem-
perature decreases, pores become smaller and their distribution become
more uniform. The obtained values of porosity were 0.288 ± 0.079%
at − 5 °C, 1.062 ± 0.082% at − 15 °C and 2.253 ± 0.089% at
− 20 °C.
3. Experimental results
For each experimental condition (temperature and strain rate), the
stress versus strain curves were plotted, and the compressive strength,
which corresponds the maximum stress reached before failure, was
recorded.
Fig. 4 shows the evolution of compressive strength of atmospheric
ice as a function of strain rate for three temperatures: −20, − 15 and
− 5 °C. The compressive strength of ice increases until it reaches a
maximum value, which is then followed by a decrease as the strain rate
increases. This transition characterizes the ductile-brittle transition,
after which, the brittle failure takes part as dominant mode of failure,
and the ice fractures without apparent plastic deformation.
Fig. 5 illustrates the evolution of the compressive strength as a
function of temperature at different strain rates. The highest values of
atmospheric ice compressive strength were obtained for a temperature
of − 15 °C. After this temperature is reached, the compressive strength
decreases, which is related to the presence of more pores and cavities at
temperature lower than − 15 °C. The evolution of porosity versus
temperature is showed in Fig. 6.
Porosity increases as the accumulation temperature decreases. This
can be mainly related to the accretion mode; as temperature decreases,
supercooled droplets reach the accumulation surface and freeze im-
mediately upon contact, air particles get trapped in the interstices
during this process, which therefore increases ice porosity.
H. Farid et al. Cold Regions Science and Technology 146 (2018) 81–86

-20°C -15°C -5°C

Fig. 3. Binary image of cross sections of atmospheric ice at − 20 °C (left), − 15 °C (center) and − 5 °C (right).

9 Data at T = -20 °C 4. Empirical failure criterion development

8 Data at T = -15 °C
Compressive strength (MPa)

7 Data at T = -5 °C 4.1. Uniaxial compression failure criterion

6
Ice shedding by mechanical breaking of atmospheric ice takes place
5
when the material reaches its rheological limits. Finding a failure cri-
4 terion associated to this type of ice will be very helpful for engineering
3 problems related to atmospheric icing.
2 Atmospheric ice behavior is affected by many environmental and
1
structural parameters, such as porosity, strain rate, and temperature,
etc. Therefore, a good failure criterion should take into account these
0
1.00E-05 1.00E-04 1.00E-03 1.00E-02 1.00E-01 1.00E+00
parameters.
Strain rate (s-1)
Strain rate is considered to be the most influential parameter of
atmospheric ice compressive strength (Kermani et al., 2007). This
Fig. 4. Evolution of compressive strength versus strain rate for different temperatures. provides the starting point for the mathematical derivation of an em-
pirical failure criterion that predicts the strength of ice near the brittle
10-4 s-1 9 failure domain.
8 The compressive strength of atmospheric ice versus strain rate, as
Compressive stregnth (MPa)

-3 -1
10 s
10-2 s-1 7
illustrated in Fig. 4, can be represented by a distribution similar to the
10-1 s-1
normal law, taking into account the influence of strain rate and por-
6
osity, we can derive the following expression:
5
2
4 α ⎛ 1 log (ε )̇ − n ⎞ ⎞
σc = exp ⎜− ⎜⎛
f (η) ⎠ ⎟
⎟

3 f (η) 2π 2⎝ (1)
⎝ ⎠
2
where ε ̇ is the strain rate, η is the porosity, f(η) is a linear function of the
1
porosity η, α is a constant depending on temperature, its dependence on
0 temperature being evaluated using a temperature shift function, and n
-25 -20 -15 -10 -5 0
is a strain rate sensitivity factor. The average relative error between the
Temperature (oC)
model and experimental results are satisfactory, as shown in Fig. 7.
Fig. 5. Compressive strength evolution as a function of temperature. Nonlinear regression was used for fitting the Eq. 1 to the experi-
mental results in each temperature. The results are presented in the
Table 1.
2.5 The values obtained of the parameter α (alpha) were always close to
the creep activation energy of ice (ranging between 45 and 90 kJ/mol
2 (Schulson, 1999)). Which promote the hypothesis suggesting that this
parameter could be related to the activation energy. Since this hy-
Porosity (%)

1.5 pothesis needs furthers investigations, it is seen to be more convenient

to express the parameter α just as an empirical parameter that depends
1 on temperature.
Plotting the evolution of the three parameters α, f(η) and n as
functions of temperature, allows us to define their values in other
0.5
ranges of temperature, as illustrated in Fig. 8(a)–(c).
By plotting the Eq. (1) for the three temperatures, one can see that
0
the three curves are closely parallel to each other (Fig. 7), which en-
-20 -15 -10 -5
hance the hypothesis that a shift function could be used to elucidate the
Temperature (oC) temperature effect on the failure criterion as used by other authors
Fig. 6. Evolution of porosity versus temperature.
(Sinha, 1978).

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H. Farid et al. Cold Regions Science and Technology 146 (2018) 81–86

Data at T = -20 °C Fig. 7. The empirical failure criterion versus experimental data.
9
Data at T = -15 °C
8
Data at T = -5 °C
7
Compressive strength (MPa)

Model at -20°C

6 Model at -15°C

Model at -5°C
5

0
1.00E-05 1.00E-04 1.00E-03 1.00E-02 1.00E-01 1.00E+00
Strain rate (s -1)

Table 1 80
Different parameters presented in the failure criterion as a function of temperature. 70
60

α Parameter
Temperature n f(η) α 50
40
− 5 °C −6.71 2.99 33.14
− 15 °C −5.87 3.22 67.31 30
− 20 °C −6.98 3.35 54.65 20
10
0
The introduction of these type of functions requires the determi- -25 -20 -15 -10 -5 0
nation of the activation energy of atmospheric ice in different tem- Temperature (oC)
peratures, which needs to further detailed investigation and was out of
the scoop of this study. (a): Evolution of parameter α as a function of temperature

4.2. Validation with compression tests data 3.4

3.35
3.3
The proposed failure criterion was developed base on the experi- 3.25
mental observations in three different temperatures (i.e − 5, − 15, and 3.2

f(η)
− 20 °C). In order to assure the reproducibility of the experimental 3.15
results, as well as to verify the prediction capacity of the failure cri- 3.1
3.05
terion in other ranges of temperature, the failure criterion parameters f 3
(η), α, and n have been identified using non-linear regression based on 2.95
Fig. 8(a)–(c) at −10 °C. The obtained values of the f(η), α, and n -25 -20 -15 -10 -5 0
parameters are presented in Table 2. Temperature (oC)
A separate set of experimental results at − 10 °C was used to com-
pare the predicted values of compressive strength of atmospheric ice (b): Evolution of parameter ( ) as a function of temperature
using the failure criterion with test results. Fig. 9 illustrates the ex-
perimental data at −10 °C versus the predicted values by the failure Temperature (oC)
criterion. -25 -20 -15 -10 -5 0
Fig. 9 shows an acceptable fitting between the failure criterion and 0
the experimental data, the average relative error being 14.52%. -1
n Parameter

-2
4.3. Sensitivity analysis -3
-4
In order to investigate the effect of the parameters α, f(η) and n on -5
the failure criterion, a sensitivity analysis has been performed by ran-
-6
ging each of these parameters between a value of +20% and − 20%
-7
from its identified value (values in Table 1), while the two other
-8
parameters were set constant.
As presented in Fig. 10, at −5 and − 15 °C, the failure criterion is
sensitive to the parameter n and α, while it is less sensitive to f(η). At a (C): Evolution of parameter n as a function of temperature
colder temperature of − 20 °C, the failure criterion is highly sensitive to Fig. 8. Evolution of the empirical failure criterion parameters with temperature.
the three parameters.

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H. Farid et al. Cold Regions Science and Technology 146 (2018) 81–86

Table 2 Table 3
The failure criterion parameters identified at − 10 °C. Summary of results from uniaxial tensile tests at the different conditions (Mohamed &
Farzaneh, 2011).
n f(η) α
Strain rate T = − 5 °C T = − 10 °C T = − 15 °C
− 6.52 3.11 46.83 (s− 1)
Tensile strength Tensile strength Tensile strength
(MPa) (MPa) (MPa)
7 Data at -10°C
4.44E-05 1.42 1.44 1.50
6 Model at -10°C 0.000111 1.42 1.43 1.45
Compressive stregnth (MPa)

0.000444 1.27 1.34 1.39

5 0.001111 1.23 1.33 1.36
0.001667 1.19 1.27 1.30
4

3 1.6

2 1.4

Tensilte strength (MPa)

1.2
1
1 Data -5°C
0 0.8 Data -15°C
1.00E-05 1.00E-04 1.00E-03 1.00E-02 1.00E-01 1.00E+00 Data -10°C
0.6 Model -5°C
Strain rate (s-1)
0.4 Model -10°C
Fig. 9. Failure criterion versus experimental data at − 10 °C. Model -15°C
0.2

0
Since the failure criterion has been calibrated for temperatures
1.00E-05 1.00E-04 1.00E-03 1.00E-02
ranging from − 5 to − 20 °C, and for strain rates higher than 10− 4 s− 1,
Strain rate (s -1)
and since we were more concerned about characterizing the atmo-
spheric ice under ice shedding conditions, these intervals of tempera- Fig. 11. Evolution of the failure criterion and comparison with the experimental data for
ture and strain rate constitute the range of its validity. tensile strength.

Table 4
4.4. Tensile failure criterion Parameters presented in the failure criterion as a function of temperature for tensile tests
data.
Ice shows brittle failure at a relatively slower strain rate in tension
Temperature n f(η) α
than in compression (Mohamed & Farzaneh, 2011). The proposed
failure criterion, presented in Eq. (1), has been verified in the case of a −5 °C − 314.66 76.79 731,708
tensile stress state in the brittle regime (for a strain rate higher than −10 °C − 303.33 94.86 41,366.9
10− 4 s− 1) using experimental data from Mohamed and Farzaneh −15 °C − 309.91 91.93 70,932.8

(Mohamed & Farzaneh, 2011).

Mohamed and Farzaneh tested the tensile strength of atmospheric
4.5. Validation with tensile tests data
ice under different temperatures, strain rates, and wind speed. Some of
these results, presented in Table 3, were used for developing the failure
Other sets of experimental data from Mohamed and Farzaneh
criterion and for validation.
(Mohamed & Farzaneh, 2011) have been used for validation purposes
Fig. 11 presents a comparison between the failure criterion and the
as shown in Fig. 12.
experimental data at − 5, − 10, and − 15 °C. The failure criterion re-
produces the tensile strength with good accuracy. The values of the
5. Conclusions
parameter α, n and f(η) for tension failure criterion are listed in Table 4.
The failure criterion predicts the tensile strength of atmospheric ice
The objective of this work was to propose an empirical failure cri-
with good accuracy, the average relative errors being 1.48%, 1.19%
terion for atmospheric ice as a function of different parameters such as
and 0.72% for temperatures of − 5, − 10 and − 15 °C respectively.
temperature, strain rate and porosity. This failure criterion provides a
good prediction of the compressive strength of atmospheric ice, the
average relative errors associated to the model being 7.32, 6.66 and

Sensitivity analysis at -5 o C Sensitivity analysis -15 o C Sensitivity analysis -20 o C

Failure criterion parameters

Failure criterion parameters

Failure criterion parameters

n n n

α α α

20% 20% 20%

f(η) f(η) f(η)
-20% -20% -20%

0 2 4 6 0 5 10 0 5 10
Compressive Stregnth (MPa) Compressive Stregnth (MPa) Compressive Stregnth (MPa)

Fig. 10. Sensitivity analysis of the failure criterion at − 5, − 15 and − 20 °C.

85
H. Farid et al. Cold Regions Science and Technology 146 (2018) 81–86

1.8 1.8
1.6 1.6

Tensile strength (MPa)

Tensile strength (MPa)
1.4 1.4
1.2 1.2
1 1
0.8 0.8
Model -5°C 0.6 Model -10°C
0.6
Series2 0.4 Series2
0.4
Series3 Series3
0.2
0.2 Series4
Series4 0
0
3.00E-05 3.00E-04 3.00E-03
3.00E-05 3.00E-04 3.00E-03
-1
Strain rate (s -1) Strain rate(s )

(a) (b)

1.8
1.6
Tensile strength (MPa)

1.4
1.2
1
Model -15°C
0.8
Series2
0.6
Series3
0.4
Series4
0.2
0
3.00E-05 3.00E-04 3.00E-03
Strain rate (s -1)

(c)
Fig. 12. Validation of the failure criterion: (a) − 5 °C, (b) − 10 °C, (c) − 15 °C.

17.72% for temperatures − 5, − 15 and − 20 °C respectively. Farid, H., Farzaneh, M., Saeidi, A., Erchiqui, F., Jan. 2016. A contribution to the study of
The proposed failure criterion was validated in the case of tensile the compressive behavior of atmospheric ice. Cold Reg. Sci. Technol. 121, 60–65.
Farid, H., Saeidi, A., Farzaneh, M., 2017. Prediction of failure in atmospheric ice under
stress state, the obtained results showed a good correlation between triaxial compressive stress. Cold Reg. Sci. Technol. 138, 46–56.
experimental data and the values obtained using the failure criterion. Farzaneh, M., Nov. 2000. Ice accretions on high-voltage conductors and insulators and
related phenomena. Philos. Trans. R. Soc. A Math. Phys. Eng. Sci. 358 (1776),
2971–3005.
Acknowledgement Farzaneh, M., 2008. Atmospheric Icing of Power Networks. Springer Science & Business
Media.
The present work was carried out within the frame work of the Farzaneh, M., Chisholm, W.A., 2009. Insulators for Icing and Polluted Environments.
Fuheng, H., Shixiong, F., 1988. Icing on overhead the transmission lines in cold moun-
Canada Research Chair on Atrmospheric Icing Engineering of Power tainous district of Southwest China and its protection. In: IWAIS, pp. 354–357.
Networks (INGIVRE). The authors would like to thank all the sponsors Hamza, H., 1984. Critical strain energy as a failure and crack propagation criterion for
of the project (Hydro-Québec, Hydro One, Réseau Transport ice. In: Proc. IAHR Int. Symp. on Ice Problems.
Kermani, M., 2007. Ice Shedding from Cables and Conductors – A Cracking Model of
d'Électricité (RTE), Alcan Cable, K-Line Insulators, Tyco Electronics,
Atmospheric Ice. University of Quebec at Chicoutimi.
Dual-ADE, and FUQAC) whose financial support made this research Kermani, M., Farzaneh, M., Gagnon, R., Sep. 2007. Compressive strength of atmospheric
possible. The authors also thank Mr. Pierre Camirand and Xavier ice. Cold Reg. Sci. Technol. 49 (3), 195–205.
Bouchard for the experimental setup. Michel, B., 1978. Ice Mechanics. Presses de l'université Laval.
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