Exercise Set 2

1. A manufacturing company has two retail outlets. It is known that 30% of the potential
customers buy products from outlet I alone, 50% buy from outlet II alone, 10% buy
from both I and II, and 10% buy from neither. Let A denote the event that a potential
customer, randomly chosen, buys from I and B denote the event that the customer
buys from II. Find the following probabilities.

(a) P( A) (b) P( A ∪ B ) (c) P(B ) (d) P( A ∩ B ) (e) P(A ∩ B ) (f) P(A ∪ B )

2. Resistors produced by a certain firm are marketed as 10-ohm resistors. However, the
actual resistances of the resistors may vary. It is observed that 5% of the values are
below 9.5 ohms and 10% are above 10.5 ohms. If two of these resistors, randomly
selected, are used in a system, find the probability that

(a) both have actual values between 9.5 and 10.5 ohms
(b) at least one has an actual value in excess of 10.5 ohms

3. A special dart board has three annular zones formed by four concentric circles of
radius 1, 2, 3 and 4 units respectively. The zones are labelled A (the smallest) to D. If
a dart is thrown at random at the board and hits it the probabilities of hitting the four
zones are as follows:

Zone X A B C D
Pr(X = x) .0625 .1875 .3125 .4375

(a) Show how to calculate the above probabilities

(b) Calculate: (i) Pr(X = C or D)
(ii) Pr(X = A or B or C)
(iii) Pr(X = A or D)

4. A box contains 100 items, 2 of which are faulty. If 2 are selected at random without
replacement calculate the probabilities that 0, 1 or 2 of the selected items are faulty.

5. An electronic components manufacturer submits tenders to three separate companies for work
over the next month. From past experience the contracts manager estimates that the
probability that each tender will be accepted as in the table below. Calculate the probability
that:

Company Probability tender

is accepted
A 0.8
B 0.6
C 0.9

(a) all tenders are accepted

(b) at least one tender is accepted
(c) only tenders A and C are accepted

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6. A consignment of 100 items usually contains 1 faulty item. If a random sample of 3 items
contains 1 or more faulty items then the consignment is rejected.
(a) What is the probability that the consignment is rejected?
(b) Due to a production error this weeks’ consignment contains 8% faulty. What is the
probability that it is accepted?

7. An electronic component consists of four switches connected in parallel. Each switch may
fail, independently of the others, with probability 0.02. What is the probability that the
component fails?

8. The probability that a component functions must be 0.999. If the component is constructed of
several identical items in parallel how many are needed if each has a failure probability of:
(a) 0.1; (b) 0.01?

9. A particular model of jet engine will fail in flight with probability p. A twin engined plane
will crash only if both engines fail together. A four-engined plane will crash if three or four
engines fail together. Assuming that engines fail independently of each other calculate:

(a) the probability that a twin engined plane will crash

(b) the probability that a four engined plane will crash
(c) the values of p for which a twin-engined plane is less likely to crash in comparison with
four engined plane.
10. If A and B are independent events, are A and B also independent? Explain.

11. Can two events be both mutually exclusive and independent? Explain.

Short answers to Exercise 2.

1. (a) 0.4 (b) 09 (c) 0.4 (d) 0.1 (e) 0.1 (f) 0.1.

2. (a) .7225 (b) .19 3. (b) 0.75; 0.5625; 0.5.

5. (a) .432 (b) .992 (c) .288
4. .9602, .0396, .0002 7. 0.024
9.(a) p2 (b) 4p3(1-p) + p4 (c) p > 1/3 (and <1)
6. (a) .0297 (b) .77869

8. (a) 3 (b) 2. 10. yes 11. no

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