This project validated a cleaning device capable of clearing out small debris from the leading edges of business jets or airliners, to keep the flow as laminar as possible on the leading edge of the wing. The cleaning concept was compatible with the surface treatment of the leading edge of commercial aircrafts. Typically this concerns the contamination of leading edges by insect impact. At first, the system was designed and a prototype manufactured. In parallel, aerodynamic and stress models were studied. Then ground experiments including tests in a wind tunnel were performed, in view of prototype validation. The prototype was subsequently modified and validated. Conclusions helped the industrialisation of the cleaning system.

The consortium was led by EPFL, who co-ordinated a preliminary project on the design of such cleaning devices in the Clean Sky call 3 CLEANLE, with several partners for manufacturing, consulting, experiment running and analysis, including a design office SME, and university wind tunnel experts. The project led to a test prototype.

The project pushed the concepts, that have attained a Research Technology Readiness Level, TRL near to TRL3 (research to prove feasibility), to evolve on the system/subsystem model and prototype demonstrator of a technology demonstration of TRL 6.