ASSIGNMENT 3

SPRING SEMESTER 2021

ES 202 - ENGINEERING STATISTICS

1. As the items come out of a production process, they are inspected for defects. A
sample of 4 items is picked at random intervals. Calculate the expected number
of defective items in the sample if approximately 1% of the items produced are
defective.

Answer: E(X) = 0.04

2. It is known that screws produced by a certain company will be defective with prob-
ability 0.01, independently of each other. The company sells the screws in packages
of 10 and offers a money-back guarantee that at most 1 of the 10 screws is defective.
What proportion of packages sold must the company replace?

Answer: 0.4%

3. Let X be a geometric random variable with probability of success p. Prove that the
1
expected value of X is . What is variance of X?
p
1 1−p
Answer: E(X) = V ar(X) =
p p2
4. A purchaser of electrical components buys them in lots of size 10. It is his policy
to inspect 3 components randomly from a lot and to accept the lot only if all 3 are
nondefective. If 30 percent of the lots have 4 defective components and 70 percent
have only 1, what proportion of lots does the purchaser reject?

Answer: 46%

5. Two coins are to be flipped. The first coin will land on heads with probability 0.6,
the second with probability 0.7. Assume that the results of the flips are independent,
and let X equal the total number of heads that result.

(a) Find P r(X = 1).

(b) Determine E(X) and V ar(X).

Answer: (a) 0.46 (b) E(X) = 1.3; V ar(X) = 0.45

6. A sample of 3 items is selected at random from a box containing 20 items of which

4 are defective. Find the expected number of defective items in the sample.
3
Answer: = 0.6
5
7. A ball is drawn from an urn containing 3 white and 3 black balls. After the ball is
drawn, it is replaced and another ball is drawn. This process goes on indefinitely.
What is the probability that, of the first 4 balls drawn, exactly 2 are white?

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 3
Answer: = 0.375
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8. On a multiple-choice exam with 3 possible answers for each of the 5 questions, what
is the probability that a student will get 4 or more correct answers just by guessing?
11
Answer: = 0.0453
243
9. A satellite system consists of 10 components and functions on any given day if at
least 7 of the 10 components function on that day. On a rainy day each of the
components independently functions with probability 0.9, whereas on a dry day
this probability is 0.95. If the probability of rain tomorrow is 0.5, what is the prob-
ability that the satellite system will not function tomorrow?

Answer: 0.0069

10. Abox contains 5 red and 5 blue marbles. Two marbles are withdrawn randomly. If
they are the same color, then you win $2; if they are different colors, then you lose
$1.00. Calculate the expected value of the amount you win?
1
Answer: = 0.66
3
11. It is known that diskettes produced by a certain company will be defective with
probability 0.01, independently of each other. The company sells the diskettes in
packages of size 10 and offers a money-back guarantee that at most 1 of the 10
diskettes in the package will be defective. The guarantee is that the customer can
return the entire package of diskettes if he or she finds more than one defective
diskette in it. If someone buys 3 packages, what is the probability that he or she
will return exactly 1 of them?

Answer: 0.0127

12. When coin 1 is flipped, it lands on heads with probability 0.4; when coin 2 is flipped,
it lands on heads with probability 0.7. One of these coins is randomly chosen and
flipped 10 times.

(a) What is the probability that the coin lands on heads on exactly 7 of the 10
flips?
(b) Given that the first of these ten flips lands heads, what is the conditional
probability that exactly 7 of the 10 flips land on heads?

Answer: (a) 0.1546 (b) 0.029

13. Suppose that a biased coin that lands on heads with probability p is flipped 10
times. Given that a total of 6 heads results, find the conditional probability that
the first 3 outcomes are

(a) HTT (meaning that the first flip results in heads, the second in tails, and the
third in tails);

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 (b) THT (meaning that the first flip results in tails, the second in heads, and the
third in tails).
1 1
Answer: (a) = 0.1 (b) = 0.1
10 10
14. The expected number of typographical errors on a page of a certain magazine is
0.2. What is the probability that the next page you read contains (a) 0 and (b) 2
or more typographical errors?

Answer: (a) e−0.2 = 0.8187 (b) 1 − 1.2e−0.2 = 0.0175

15. A certain typing agency employs 2 typists. The average number of errors per article
is 3 when typed by the first typist and 4.2 when typed by the second. If your article
is equally likely to be typed by either typist, approximate the probability that it
will have no errors.

1 −3
Answer: 2
e + 12 e−4.2 = 0.0324

16. Suppose that the average number of accidents occurring on a highway each day is
3.

(a) Find the probability that 3 or more accidents will occur today.
(b) Repeat part (a) under the assumption that at least 1 accident will occur today.

Answer: (a) 0.5768 (b) 0.6070

17. A fair coin is continually flipped until heads appears for the 10th time. Let X de-
note the number of tails that occur. Compute the probability mass function of X.
x+9 1 x+10



Answer: P r(X = x) = x 2
f or x = 0, 1, 2, · · · , ∞

18. If X is a geometric random variable, show that

P r(X = n + k|X > n) = P r(X = k).

19. The probabilities of having a rainy day, a cloudy day, and a sunny day are 0.1, 0.3,
and 0.6 respectively.

(a) Find the probability that out of next 10 days we have 6 sunny days and 3
cloudy days.
(b) An ice-cream shop earns on the average $1000 on a sunny day, $500 on a
cloudy day, and $100 on a rainy day. What is the average weekly income of
this shop?

Answer: (a) 0.1058 (b) Average Income = $760/day or $5320/week

20. An industrial product is shipped in lots of 20. Testing to determine whether an

item is defective is costly, and hence the manufacturer samples his production rather
than using a 100% inspection plan. A sampling plan, constructed to minimize the
number of defectives shipped to customers, calls for sampling five items from each

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lot and rejecting the lot if more than one defective is observed. (If the lot is re-
jected, each item in it is later tested.) If a lot contains four defectives, what is the
probability that it will be rejected?

Answer: 0.2487