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Arithmetic

by sud21 » Sat Sep 19, 2015 6:12 am
16 horses can haul a load of lumber in 24 minutes. 12 horses started hauling a load and after 14 minutes, 12 mules joined the horses. Will it take less than a quarter-hour for all of them together to finish hauling the load?

1. Mules work more slowly than horses.
2. 48 mules can haul the same load of lumber in 16 minutes.
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Source: — Data Sufficiency |
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by Jim@StratusPrep » Mon Sep 21, 2015 1:00 pm
There is no need to do any calculation. You simply need the rate of the mules to be able to answer the question. Statement 2 is your answer. If you want some more information on this take a look here: GMAT Work
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by Matt@VeritasPrep » Fri Sep 25, 2015 1:53 am
From the prompt, we know that 16 horses can do the job in 24 minutes. This means ONE horse does (1/16) of the job in 24 minutes, so ONE horse would take 16*24 = 384 minutes to do the job. Hence each horse has a rate of (1/384) of the job per minute.

If 12 horses work for 14 minutes, we have 12*14 = 168 horse-minutes of work. That means we've accomplished 168 * (1/384), or (7/16) of the job.

The next issue is whether the prompt means 15 additional minutes or 15 minutes total. If it means 15 minutes total, then S1 and S2 are BOTH sufficient, as the mules will not be able to do enough work in 1 minute to finish the job.

If it means 15 additional minutes, then we need the mules' rate. S1 doesn't give us that, but S2 does, so only S2 is sufficient.
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