Development of performance evaluation system for screening unit of a paper plant

The present paper deals with the development of performance evaluation system for screening unit of a paper plant. The paper plant consists of various units viz. feeding, chipping, digesting, washing, bleaching screening, stock preparation and paper making etc. One of the most important functionaries of a paper plant is screening unit. This unit consists of four subsystems arranged in hybrid configurations. The performance evaluation system has been developed with the help of mathematical formulation based on Markov Birth-Death process using probabilistic approach. For this purpose, first differential equations have been developed. Then these equations are further solved by using normalizing conditions so as to determine the steady state availability i.e. evaluation of performance of screening unit. This performance evaluation system deals with the quantitative analysis of all factors (courses of actions and states of nature), which influence all maintenance decisions associated with the screening unit. The results of this paper are therefore, considered to be useful for the performance evaluation and determination of the best possible maintenance operations in a paper plant concerned.