Analysis of reliability and availability of serial processes of plastic‐pipe manufacturing plant : A case study

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to compute reliability, availability, and mean time before failure of the process of a plastic‐pipe manufacturing plant consisting of a ( K, N ) system for various choices of failure and repair rates of sub‐systems. This plant consists of eight sub‐systems. Design/methodology/approach – In this paper the Chapman‐Kolmogorov differential equations are formed using mnemonic rule from the transition diagram of the plastic‐pipe manufacturing plant. The governing differential equations are solved using matrix method in order to find the reliability of the system with the help of MATLAB software. The same system of differential equations is solved numerically using Runge‐Kutta fourth order method to validate the results obtain by MATLAB. Findings – The findings in the paper are an analysis of reliability, availability and mean time before failure of plastic‐pipe manufacturing plant has been carried out. Practical implications – This paper proposes matrix calculus method using MATLAB software to find out the reliability of the plastic‐pipe manufacturing plant. This approach can be implemented to find reliability of other manufacturing plants as well. Originality/value – The findings suggest that the management of the plastic‐pipe manufacturing plant 's sensitive sub‐system is important to improve its performance.