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• A new enclosed melting system was built for deicing the bottom of a train. • A new method was used for simulating gravity shedding melting in complex models. • The effect of supply air properties on system performance was studied. In winter, a large amount of icing and snowing occurs in outdoor equipment and systems, which adversely affects their lifespan. The melting process is divided into two parts: convection melting and gravity shedding melting. This paper is based on an experiment with a real high-speed train unit, and it establishes a three-dimensional computational fluid dynamics model of the bogie area to validate the mathematical model of the winter ice melting experiment. A numerical simulation was used to calculate the airflow in the baffle-enclosed space and to predict the effects of interactions between air and the ice body on heat transfer and phase change. The influence of air velocity and temperature on the heat transfer was analyzed. The computational simulation effectively quantifies the amount of heat transfer and energy consumption under different conditions. This paper also presents a research method for the simulation of gravity shedding in complex models. These models provide information for the construction of similar ice melting models. This paper has suggested that for thin ice bodies, convection melting was the dominant strategy. For thick ice bodies, however, gravity shedding melting became dominant. The study also confirmed that enclosed hot-air ice-melting systems gave a better energy performance than unenclosed systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]