Ritter, several of my friends, who are aeronautical engineers says that ice bridging is a non-factor.
One of them sent me this snippet, which is from an AOPA article:
"The time-worn advice was to allow a certain amount of ice to form before inflating the boots. That theory was motivated by the belief that cycling the boots too often would cause ice to make a shell-like formation beyond boot-inflation limits. Ice bridging, it was called.
The latest research and scientific conferences, however, have come to the conclusion that ice bridging is a myth. It's true that more ice will shed if more ice is allowed to build on a booted surface. But experts now say there's no reason to believe that ice can continue to form and bridge over leading edges, and leave boots to helplessly pulsate behind an ever-growing sheath of ice.
Those yarns apparently got their start back in the 1930s, when boot inflation pressures were low, inflation times were lengthy, and there were fewer inflatable cuffs within the booted areas.
The most modern boot systems incorporate ice-detecting sensors that automatically initiate inflation cycles."
Now I've been taught like every pilot has, that we must not be too "trigger happy" with the de-ice boots, but I'm left wondering now.
And the idea to try it IRL doesn not appeal to me
Any ideas ???
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