Abstract: A method for producing substantially dendritic snow includes: a) supplying a flow of humid air (1) and a flow of cold air (9) into a substantially closed space (15, 16, 17) to mix the two air flows and create an atmosphere oversaturated with water within the space; b) forming ice crystals and allowing snowflakes to grow from the oversaturated atmosphere, keeping the ice crystals and growing snowflakes floating within the space and allowing them to grow over a predetermined period of time sufficiently long to obtain snowflakes having a predefined size, the floating condition being achieved by moving the ice crystals and growing snowflakes, on average, along a substantially helical trajectory by the air flow, which results in the snowflakes being distributed according to their size along the substantially helical trajectory; and c) thereafter releasing the predefined size snowflakes via a release opening (7) of the space by a carrier air flow (3).
Type:
Grant
Filed:
September 9, 2010
Date of Patent:
August 30, 2016
Assignees:
TECHNISCHE UNIVERSITÄT WIEN, UNIVERSITÄT FÜR FODENKULTUR WIEN
Inventors:
Meinhard Breiling, Michael Bacher, Sergey Sokratov, Frederick Geroge Best