Model development for optimum acid usage and production efficiencies

摘要

The efficiency of the acid cleaning process is critical in ensuring optimum quality at an electroplatingrnfacility. This efficiency depends on various variables including the operating temperature,rnacid/inhibitor concentration, rate of contamination etc. Dumping of acid solutions is a frequentrnoccurrence at electroplating facilities. In most instances the remaining usable lifespan of the acidrnis unknown. It would be ideal to predict the actual rate of cleaning and contamination of the acidrnsolution. This would be useful in predicting acid dosing, acid lifespan and acid efficiency. A majorrnconsideration to this problem is the uncertainties associated with the variables for the acid usage.rnThese include changes in operations, changes in temperature, concentration changes, contaminantrnchanges etc. In this study a model is developed that predicts the acid consumption whilst allowingrnfor all operational uncertainties. A comparison is presented on the results of this model and existingrnplant data. This model finds further application in predicting the production rate of metal throughrnan electroplating facility. A Mathlab Case study on this application is presented.