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NCERT Exemplar · Q13

Q.A company manufactures two types of screws A and B. All the screws have to pass through a threading machine and a slotting machine. A box of Type A screws requires 2 minutes on the threading machine and 3 minutes on the slotting machine. A box of type B screws requires 8 minutes of threading on the threading machine and 2 minutes on the slotting machine. In a week, each machine is available for 60 hours. On selling these screws, the company gets a profit of Rs 100 per box on type A screws and Rs 170 per box on type B screws. Formulate this problem as a LPP given that the objective is to maximise profit.

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This is a linear programming problem where we maximise profit Z=100x+170yZ = 100x + 170y subject to time constraints on two machines: 2x+8y≤36002x + 8y \le 3600 (threading), 3x+2y≤36003x + 2y \le 3600 (slotting), with x,y≥0x, y \ge 0.

Why this is a Linear Programming Problem

Linear Programming (LP) is used when you have a linear objective (profit, cost, etc.) to maximise or minimise, subject to linear constraints (limited resources, time, materials). Here, the company has two limited resources — threading machine time and slotting machine time — and wants to decide how many boxes of each screw type to produce to get the highest profit.

The key insight: every box of screws consumes a fixed amount of time on each machine. The total time used cannot exceed what's available. This naturally gives us inequalities.

Step-by-step formulation

1. Define the decision variables

Let xx = number of boxes of Type A screws produced per week.

Let yy = number of boxes of Type B screws produced per week.

These are the quantities we can control. They cannot be negative, so x≥0x \ge 0, y≥0y \ge 0.

2. Write the objective function (profit)

Profit per box of A = Rs 100, per box of B = Rs 170.

Total profit Z=100x+170yZ = 100x + 170y.

We want to maximise ZZ.

3. Identify the constraints from machine time

First, convert hours to minutes — both machines are available for 60 hours per week.

60 hours=60×60=360060 \text{ hours} = 60 \times 60 = 3600 minutes.

Threading machine constraint:

  • Type A: 2 minutes per box → 2x2x minutes total
  • Type B: 8 minutes per box → 8y8y minutes total
  • Total threading time used: 2x+8y2x + 8y
  • This cannot exceed 3600 minutes: 2x+8y≤36002x + 8y \le 3600

Slotting machine constraint:

  • Type A: 3 minutes per box → 3x3x minutes total
  • Type B: 2 minutes per box → 2y2y minutes total
  • Total slotting time used: 3x+2y3x + 2y
  • This cannot exceed 3600 minutes: 3x+2y≤36003x + 2y \le 3600 …

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