Exercise 12.2: Linear Programming 519
Exercise 12.2: Linear Programming 519
EXERCISE 12.2
1. Reshma wishes to mix two types of food P and Q in such a way that the vitamin
contents of the mixture contain at least 8 units of vitamin A and 11 units of
vitamin B. Food P costs Rs 60/kg and Food Q costs Rs 80/kg. Food P contains
3 units/kg of Vitamin A and 5 units / kg of Vitamin B while food Q contains
4 units/kg of Vitamin A and 2 units/kg of vitamin B. Determine the minimum cost
of the mixture.
2. One kind of cake requires 200g of flour and 25g of fat, and another kind of cake
requires 100g of flour and 50g of fat. Find the maximum number of cakes which
can be made from 5kg of flour and 1 kg of fat assuming that there is no shortage
of the other ingredients used in making the cakes.
3. A factory makes tennis rackets and cricket bats. A tennis racket takes 1.5 hours
of machine time and 3 hours of craftman’s time in its making while a cricket bat
takes 3 hour of machine time and 1 hour of craftman’s time. In a day, the factory
has the availability of not more than 42 hours of machine time and 24 hours of
craftsman’s time.
(i) What number of rackets and bats must be made if the factory is to work
at full capacity?
(ii) If the profit on a racket and on a bat is Rs 20 and Rs 10 respectively, find
the maximum profit of the factory when it works at full capacity.
4. A manufacturer produces nuts and bolts. It takes 1 hour of work on machine A
and 3 hours on machine B to produce a package of nuts. It takes 3 hours on
machine A and 1 hour on machine B to produce a package of bolts. He earns a
profit of Rs17.50 per package on nuts and Rs 7.00 per package on bolts. How
many packages of each should be produced each day so as to maximise his
profit, if he operates his machines for at the most 12 hours a day?
5. A factory manufactures two types of screws, A and B. Each type of screw
requires the use of two machines, an automatic and a hand operated. It takes
4 minutes on the automatic and 6 minutes on hand operated machines to
manufacture a package of screws A, while it takes 6 minutes on automatic and
3 minutes on the hand operated machines to manufacture a package of screws
B. Each machine is available for at the most 4 hours on any day. The manufacturer
can sell a package of screws A at a profit of Rs 7 and screws B at a profit of
Rs 10. Assuming that he can sell all the screws he manufactures, how many
packages of each type should the factory owner produce in a day in order to
maximise his profit? Determine the maximum profit.
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Miscellaneous Examples
Example 9 (Diet problem) A dietician has to develop a special diet using two foods
P and Q. Each packet (containing 30 g) of food P contains 12 units of calcium, 4 units
of iron, 6 units of cholesterol and 6 units of vitamin A. Each packet of the same quantity
of food Q contains 3 units of calcium, 20 units of iron, 4 units of cholesterol and 3 units
of vitamin A. The diet requires atleast 240 units of calcium, atleast 460 units of iron and
at most 300 units of cholesterol. How many packets of each food should be used to
minimise the amount of vitamin A in the diet? What is the minimum amount of vitamin A?
Solution Let x and y be the number of packets of food P and Q respectively. Obviously
x ≥ 0, y ≥ 0. Mathematical formulation of the given problem is as follows:
Minimise Z = 6x + 3y (vitamin A)
subject to the constraints
12x + 3y ≥ 240 (constraint on calcium), i.e. 4x + y ≥ 80 ... (1)
4x + 20y ≥ 460 (constraint on iron), i.e. x + 5y ≥ 115 ... (2)
6x + 4y ≤ 300 (constraint on cholesterol), i.e. 3x + 2y ≤ 150 ... (3)
x ≥ 0, y ≥ 0 ... (4)
Let us graph the inequalities (1) to (4).
The feasible region (shaded) determined by the constraints (1) to (4) is shown in
Fig 12.10 and note that it is bounded.
Fig 12.10
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The coordinates of the corner points L, M and N are (2, 72), (15, 20) and (40, 15)
respectively. Let us evaluate Z at these points:
From the table, we find that Z is minimum at the point (15, 20). Hence, the amount
of vitamin A under the constraints given in the problem will be minimum, if 15 packets
of food P and 20 packets of food Q are used in the special diet. The minimum amount
of vitamin A will be 150 units.
Example 10 (Manufacturing problem) A manufacturer has three machines I, II
and III installed in his factory. Machines I and II are capable of being operated for
at most 12 hours whereas machine III must be operated for atleast 5 hours a day. She
produces only two items M and N each requiring the use of all the three machines.
The number of hours required for producing 1 unit of each of M and N on the three
machines are given in the following table:
Items Number of hours required on machines
I II III
M 1 2 1
N 2 1 1.25
She makes a profit of Rs 600 and Rs 400 on items M and N respectively. How many
of each item should she produce so as to maximise her profit assuming that she can sell
all the items that she produced? What will be the maximum profit?
Solution Let x and y be the number of items M and N respectively.
Total profit on the production = Rs (600 x + 400 y)
Mathematical formulation of the given problem is as follows:
Maximise Z = 600 x + 400 y
subject to the constraints:
x + 2y ≤ 12 (constraint on Machine I) ... (1)
2x + y ≤ 12 (constraint on Machine II) ... (2)
5
x+ y ≥ 5 (constraint on Machine III) ... (3)
4
x ≥ 0, y ≥ 0 ... (4)
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Let us draw the graph of constraints (1) to (4). ABCDE is the feasible region
(shaded) as shown in Fig 12.11 determined by the constraints (1) to (4). Observe that
the feasible region is bounded, coordinates of the corner points A, B, C, D and E are
(5, 0) (6, 0), (4, 4), (0, 6) and (0, 4) respectively.
Fig 12.11
Let us evaluate Z = 600 x + 400 y at these corner points.
We see that the point (4, 4) is giving the maximum value of Z. Hence, the
manufacturer has to produce 4 units of each item to get the maximum profit of Rs 4000.
Example 11 (Transportation problem) There are two factories located one at
place P and the other at place Q. From these locations, a certain commodity is to be
delivered to each of the three depots situated at A, B and C. The weekly requirements
of the depots are respectively 5, 5 and 4 units of the commodity while the production
capacity of the factories at P and Q are respectively 8 and 6 units. The cost of
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8
s1
x 0 –x
50
s 16 y –y
R Rs 100
A B C
Depot 5 units 5 units Depot 4 units Depot
]
0
y)
10
Rs 100 –
Rs
5–x (5
5 – y Rs 120 +
x)
–
[ (5
Q –
6 units 6
Factory
Fig 12.12
Hence, we have x ≥ 0, y ≥ 0 and 8 – x – y ≥ 0
i.e. x ≥ 0, y ≥ 0 and x + y ≤ 8
Now, the weekly requirement of the depot at A is 5 units of the commodity. Since
x units are transported from the factory at P, the remaining (5 – x) units need to be
transported from the factory at Q. Obviously, 5 – x ≥ 0, i.e. x ≤ 5.
Similarly, (5 – y) and 6 – (5 – x + 5 – y) = x + y – 4 units are to be transported from
the factory at Q to the depots at B and C respectively.
Thus, 5 – y ≥ 0 , x + y – 4 ≥0
i.e. y≤5 , x+y≥ 4
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2. A farmer mixes two brands P and Q of cattle feed. Brand P, costing Rs 250 per
bag, contains 3 units of nutritional element A, 2.5 units of element B and 2 units
of element C. Brand Q costing Rs 200 per bag contains 1.5 units of nutritional
element A, 11.25 units of element B, and 3 units of element C. The minimum
requirements of nutrients A, B and C are 18 units, 45 units and 24 units respectively.
Determine the number of bags of each brand which should be mixed in order to
produce a mixture having a minimum cost per bag? What is the minimum cost of
the mixture per bag?
3. A dietician wishes to mix together two kinds of food X and Y in such a way that
the mixture contains at least 10 units of vitamin A, 12 units of vitamin B and
8 units of vitamin C. The vitamin contents of one kg food is given below:
Food Vitamin A Vitamin B Vitamin C
X 1 2 3
Y 2 2 1
One kg of food X costs Rs 16 and one kg of food Y costs Rs 20. Find the least
cost of the mixture which will produce the required diet?
4. A manufacturer makes two types of toys A and B. Three machines are needed
for this purpose and the time (in minutes) required for each toy on the machines
is given below:
Types of Toys Machines
I II III
A 12 18 6
B 6 0 9
Each machine is available for a maximum of 6 hours per day. If the profit on
each toy of type A is Rs 7.50 and that on each toy of type B is Rs 5, show that 15
toys of type A and 30 of type B should be manufactured in a day to get maximum
profit.
5. An aeroplane can carry a maximum of 200 passengers. A profit of Rs 1000 is
made on each executive class ticket and a profit of Rs 600 is made on each
economy class ticket. The airline reserves at least 20 seats for executive class.
However, at least 4 times as many passengers prefer to travel by economy class
than by the executive class. Determine how many tickets of each type must be
sold in order to maximise the profit for the airline. What is the maximum profit?
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6. Two godowns A and B have grain capacity of 100 quintals and 50 quintals
respectively. They supply to 3 ration shops, D, E and F whose requirements are
60, 50 and 40 quintals respectively. The cost of transportation per quintal from
the godowns to the shops are given in the following table:
Transportation cost per quintal (in Rs)
From/To A B
D 6 4
E 3 2
F 2.50 3
How should the supplies be transported in order that the transportation cost is
minimum? What is the minimum cost?
7. An oil company has two depots A and B with capacities of 7000 L and 4000 L
respectively. The company is to supply oil to three petrol pumps, D, E and F
whose requirements are 4500L, 3000L and 3500L respectively. The distances
(in km) between the depots and the petrol pumps is given in the following table:
Distance in (km.)
From / To A B
D 7 3
E 6 4
F 3 2
Assuming that the transportation cost of 10 litres of oil is Re 1 per km, how
should the delivery be scheduled in order that the transportation cost is minimum?
What is the minimum cost?
8. A fruit grower can use two types of fertilizer in his garden, brand P and brand Q.
The amounts (in kg) of nitrogen, phosphoric acid, potash, and chlorine in a bag of
each brand are given in the table. Tests indicate that the garden needs at least
240 kg of phosphoric acid, at least 270 kg of potash and at most 310 kg of
chlorine.
If the grower wants to minimise the amount of nitrogen added to the garden,
how many bags of each brand should be used? What is the minimum amount of
nitrogen added in the garden?
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kg per bag
Brand P Brand Q
Nitrogen 3 3.5
Phosphoric acid 1 2
Potash 3 1.5
Chlorine 1.5 2
9. Refer to Question 8. If the grower wants to maximise the amount of nitrogen
added to the garden, how many bags of each brand should be added? What is
the maximum amount of nitrogen added?
10. A toy company manufactures two types of dolls, A and B. Market research and
available resources have indicated that the combined production level should not
exceed 1200 dolls per week and the demand for dolls of type B is at most half of that
for dolls of type A. Further, the production level of dolls of type A can exceed three
times the production of dolls of other type by at most 600 units. If the company
makes profit of Rs 12 and Rs 16 per doll respectively on dolls A and B, how many of
each should be produced weekly in order to maximise the profit?
Summary
A linear programming problem is one that is concerned with finding the optimal
value (maximum or minimum) of a linear function of several variables (called
objective function) subject to the conditions that the variables are
non-negative and satisfy a set of linear inequalities (called linear constraints).
Variables are sometimes called decision variables and are non-negative.
A few important linear programming problems are:
(i) Diet problems
(ii) Manufacturing problems
(iii) Transportation problems
The common region determined by all the constraints including the non-negative
constraints x ≥ 0, y ≥ 0 of a linear programming problem is called the feasible
region (or solution region) for the problem.
Points within and on the boundary of the feasible region represent feasible
solutions of the constraints.
Any point outside the feasible region is an infeasible solution.
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