1

THE UNIVERSITY OF THE WEST INDIES

ST. AUGUSTINE
EXAMINATIONS OF May 2010

Code and Name of

Course: MATH 2240 - Statistics for Engineers

Date and Time:

Paper:
Duration: 2 hours

INSTRUCTIONS TO CANDIDATES: This paper has 5

pages and

questions

ANSWER FOUR QUESTIONS INCLUDING AT LEAST ONE OF QUESTIONS FIVE OR SIX.

Statistical Tables are provided.

Graph Paper is provided.
Non Programmable Calculators are allowed

The University of the West Indies

Course Code:

200/200/.

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________

DO NOT WRITE OR TYPE ON THE BACK OF THIS SHEET: USE ONE SIDE ONLY

INSTRUCTIONS: Each page must be signed by the Examiners and where applicable, the University Examiner and/or
the External Examiner. Where the examination does not require a University Examiner, the form must be signed by the First
and Second Examiners. Completed forms should be handed to the Assistant Registrar (Examinations). The EXTERNAL
EXAMINER is requested to sign the question paper and return it with comments, it any, (on a separate sheet), to the Assistant
Registrar (Examinations).
.
First Examiner

..
University Examiner

Date: 20/../..

Date: 20..//

Second Examiner

.
External Examiner (where applicable)

Date: 20/../..

Date: 20..//

THE UNIVERSITY OF THE WEST INDIES

ST. AUGUSTINE
EXAMINATIONS OF May 2010

Code and Name of

Course: MATH 2240 - Statistics for Engineers

Date and Time:

Paper:
Duration: 2 hours

INSTRUCTIONS TO CANDIDATES: This paper has 5

pages and

questions

ANSWER FOUR QUESTIONS INCLUDING AT LEAST ONE OF QUESTIONS FIVE OR SIX.

PLEASE TURN TO THE NEXT PAGE

The University of the West Indies

Course Code:

200/200/.

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________

DO NOT WRITE OR TYPE ON THE BACK OF THIS SHEET: USE ONE SIDE ONLY

INSTRUCTIONS: Each page must be signed by the Examiners and where applicable, the University Examiner and/or
the External Examiner. Where the examination does not require a University Examiner, the form must be signed by the First
and Second Examiners. Completed forms should be handed to the Assistant Registrar (Examinations). The EXTERNAL
EXAMINER is requested to sign the question paper and return it with comments, it any, (on a separate sheet), to the Assistant
Registrar (Examinations).
.
First Examiner

..
University Examiner

Date: 20/../..

Date: 20..//

Second Examiner

.
External Examiner (where applicable)

Date: 20/../..

Date: 20..//

Page 2

1(i)

Define the following statistical terms:

a. Outcome
b. Sample Space
c. Event
d. Random Variable
[4]

(ii)

NIS monthly payments are based on the numbers of Mondays in the month. What is the probability that
a 31 day month will have five Mondays? (Assume that there is equal chance of any one of the seven
days being the first day of a month)
[6]

(ii)

State Bayes Theorem

At a certain gas station, 40% of the customers use regular unleaded gas, 35% use extra unleaded gas and
25% use premium unleaded gas. Of those customers using regular gas, only 30% fill their tanks. Of
those customers using extra gas, 60% fill their tanks, whereas of those using premium, 50% fill their
tanks.
a. What is the probability that the next customer will request extra unleaded gas and fill the tank? State
the rule used.
b. What is the probability that the next customer fills the tank?
c. If the next customer fills the tank, what is the probability that regular gas is not requested?
[15]

2. (i) Let X denote the amount of space occupied by an article placed in a two cubic feet packing container. The
pdf of X is
2

kx
f ( x)

a.
b.
c.

0 x2
otherwise

Find the value of k.

Obtain the cdf of X.
Compute E( X ) and x .
[10]

(ii)

Time headway in traffic flow is the elapsed time between the times that one car finishes passing a
fixed point and the instant that the next car begins to pass that point. Let X = the time headway for two
randomly chosen consecutive cars on a freeway during a period of heavy flow. The following pdf of X
is

The University of the West Indies

Course Code:

200/200/.

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________

DO NOT WRITE OR TYPE ON THE BACK OF THIS SHEET: USE ONE SIDE ONLY

INSTRUCTIONS: Each page must be signed by the Examiners and where applicable, the University Examiner and/or
the External Examiner. Where the examination does not require a University Examiner, the form must be signed by the First
and Second Examiners. Completed forms should be handed to the Assistant Registrar (Examinations). The EXTERNAL
EXAMINER is requested to sign the question paper and return it with comments, it any, (on a separate sheet), to the Assistant
Registrar (Examinations).
.
First Examiner

..
University Examiner

Date: 20/../..

Date: 20..//

Second Examiner

.
External Examiner (where applicable)

Date: 20/../..

Date: 20..//

Page 3

.15 x .5

.15e
f x
0

x .5
otherwise

What is the probability that the time headway is at most 6 seconds?

[6]

(iii)

In a large shipment of parts, 1% of the parts do not conform to specifications. The supplier inspects a
random sample of 30 parts, and the random variable X denotes the number of parts in the sample that do
not conform to specifications. The purchaser inspects another random sample of 20 parts, and the
random variable Y denotes the number of parts in this sample that do not conform to specifications.
What is the probability that X 1 and Y 1?
[7]
(State any assumptions made.)
Is inspection an effective means of achieving quality?
[2]

3(i)

The distribution of resistance for resistors of a certain type is known to be normal, with 10% of all
resistors having a resistance exceeding 10.634 ohms, and 5% having a resistance smaller than 9.7565
ohms. What are the mean value and standard deviation of the resistance distribution?
[8]

(ii)

The lifetime of a certain type of battery is normally distributed with mean value 12 hours and standard
deviation 1 hour. There are four batteries in a package. What lifetime value is such that the total
lifetime of all batteries in a package exceeds that value for only 5% of all packages?
[7]

(iii)

State three conditions necessary for a Poisson Process to occur.

[3]

The number of tickets issued by a meter reader for parking-meter violations can be modeled by a
Poisson process with a rate parameter of five per hour.
a. What is the probability that exactly three tickets are given out during a particular hour?
b. How many tickets do you expect to be given during a 45-min period?

4(i)

[5]
[2]

The accompanying data describe flexural strength (Mpa) for concrete beams of a certain type.
9.2
6.9
8.6
8.8

9.7
8.2
7.8
8.7

8.8
8.3
7.5
12.6

The University of the West Indies

10.7
7.3
8.0
12.3

8.4
9.1
7.3
12.8

8.7
7.8
8.9
11.7

10.7
8.0
10.0

Course Code:

200/200/.

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________

DO NOT WRITE OR TYPE ON THE BACK OF THIS SHEET: USE ONE SIDE ONLY

INSTRUCTIONS: Each page must be signed by the Examiners and where applicable, the University Examiner and/or
the External Examiner. Where the examination does not require a University Examiner, the form must be signed by the First
and Second Examiners. Completed forms should be handed to the Assistant Registrar (Examinations). The EXTERNAL
EXAMINER is requested to sign the question paper and return it with comments, it any, (on a separate sheet), to the Assistant
Registrar (Examinations).
.
First Examiner

..
University Examiner

Date: 20/../..

Date: 20..//

Second Examiner

.
External Examiner (where applicable)

Date: 20/../..

Date: 20..//

Page 4

a. Calculate a point estimate of the mean value of strength for the conceptual population of all beams
manufactured in this fashion, and state which estimator you used. Hint: xi 246.8.
[2]
b. Calculate and interpret a point estimate of the population standard deviation . Which estimator did
you use? Hint: xi2 2327.54.
[4]
c. Calculate a point estimate of the proportion of all such beams whose flexural strength exceeds 11
Mpa. Hint: Think of an observation as a success if it exceeds 11.
[2]

(ii)

A random sample of n items manufactured by a certain company is selected. Let X = the number among
the n that are flawed and let p = P (item is flawed). Assume that only X is observed, rather than the
sequence of S's and F's.
a. Derive the maximum likelihood estimator of p . If n = 25 and x = 5, what is the estimate? [6]
b. Is the estimator of part (a) unbiased?
[2]
c. If n = 25 and x = 5, what is the mle of the probability that none of the next five items examined is
flawed?
[2]

(iii)

A random sample of n = 8 E-glass fiber test specimens of a certain type yielded a sample mean
interfacial shear yield stress of 30.5 and a sample standard deviation of 3.0. Assuming that interfacial
shear yield stress is normally distributed, compute a 95% CI for true average stress.
[7]

5(i)

Light bulbs of a certain type are advertised as having an average lifetime of 800 hours. The price of
these bulbs is very favorable, so a potential customer has decided to go ahead with a purchase
arrangement unless it can be conclusively demonstrated that the true average lifetime is smaller than
what is advertised. A random sample of 50 bulbs was selected, the lifetime of each bulb determined,
and the appropriate hypotheses were tested using MINITAB, resulting in the accompanying output.
Variable
Lifetime

n
50

Mean St. Dev

738.44 38.20

SE of Mean
Z
5.40
-2.14

P-Value
0.016

What conclusion would be appropriate for a significance level of .05?

(ii)

[5]

The desired percentage Si O2 in a certain type of aluminous cement is 5.5. To test whether the true
average percentage is 5.5 for a particular production facility using a significance level of .01, 16
independently obtained samples are analyzed. Suppose that the percentage of Si O2 in a sample is

The University of the West Indies

Course Code:

200/200/.

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________

DO NOT WRITE OR TYPE ON THE BACK OF THIS SHEET: USE ONE SIDE ONLY

INSTRUCTIONS: Each page must be signed by the Examiners and where applicable, the University Examiner and/or
the External Examiner. Where the examination does not require a University Examiner, the form must be signed by the First
and Second Examiners. Completed forms should be handed to the Assistant Registrar (Examinations). The EXTERNAL
EXAMINER is requested to sign the question paper and return it with comments, it any, (on a separate sheet), to the Assistant
Registrar (Examinations).
.
First Examiner

..
University Examiner

Date: 20/../..

Date: 20..//

Second Examiner

.
External Examiner (where applicable)

Date: 20/../..

Date: 20..//

Page 5

normally distributed with .3 and that x 5.25.

a. Does this indicate conclusively that the true average percentage differs from 5.5?
[6]
b. If the true average percentage is 5.6 and a level .01 based on n = 16 is used, what is the
probability of detecting this departure from H 0 ?
[3]

(iii)

Consider the accompanying data on breaking load (kg/25 mm width) for various fabrics in both an
unabraded condition and an abraded condition. Test at significance level .01 whether or not the true
mean breaking load is greater for unbraded condition than for abraded.
Fabric

1
25.6
26.5

U
A

2
48.8
52.5

3
49.8
46.5

4
43.2
36.5

5
38.7
34.5

6
55.0
20.0

7
36.4
28.5

8
51.5
46.0
[11]

6.

The accompanying data on x = current density (mA/cm 2 ) and y = rate of deposition ( m/min) appeared
in a recent study.
x
y

20
0.24

40
1.20

60
1.71

80
2.22

a. Construct a scatter plot of the data. Does there appear to be a very strong relationship between the
current density and rate of deposition?
[3]
b. Do you agree with the claim by the articles author that a linear relationship was obtained from the
tin-lead rate of deposition as a function of current density? Explain your reasoning.
[15]
c. What is the expected change in the rate of deposition for a change of 1 mA/cm 2 in the current
density?
[2]
d. What is the expected deposition rate when the current density is 50 mA/cm 2 ?

[5]

END OF QUESTION PAPER

The University of the West Indies

Course Code:

200/200/.

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________

DO NOT WRITE OR TYPE ON THE BACK OF THIS SHEET: USE ONE SIDE ONLY

INSTRUCTIONS: Each page must be signed by the Examiners and where applicable, the University Examiner and/or
the External Examiner. Where the examination does not require a University Examiner, the form must be signed by the First
and Second Examiners. Completed forms should be handed to the Assistant Registrar (Examinations). The EXTERNAL
EXAMINER is requested to sign the question paper and return it with comments, it any, (on a separate sheet), to the Assistant
Registrar (Examinations).
.
First Examiner

..
University Examiner

Date: 20/../..

Date: 20..//

Second Examiner

.
External Examiner (where applicable)

Date: 20/../..

Date: 20..//