Question 72

Six drums are used to store water. Five drums are of equal capacity, while the sixth drum has double the capacity of each of these five drums. On one morning, three drums are found half full, two are found two-thirds full and one is found completely full. It is attempted to transfer all the water to the smaller drums. How many smaller drums are adequate to store the water?

Solution

Let's five small drums have a capacity of 1 unit capacity each and one bigger drum has that of 2 units capacity. We need to consider two cases here. One with minimum volume and the other with maximum volume.

Case 1: Minimum value is possible if the bigger drum is half filled. So, total volume of water = 1 + 2 * (1/2) + 2 * (2/3) + 1 = 26/6 ~ 4.3

Case 2: Maximum value is possible if the bigger drum is completely full. So, total volume of water = 2 + 3 * (1/2) + 2 * (2/3) = 29/6 = 4.833

In any case volume of water is more than 4 units and less than 5 units. Hence, exactly 5 smaller drums are adequate to store the water.


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