Question

Jack can paint a room in 11 hours, and his sister Jessie can paint the same room in 14.5 hours. How long, to the nearest tenth of hours, will it take them to paint the room if they work together?

Answer 1

To find out how long it will take Jack and Jessie to paint the room together, we can use the concept of work rates.

Jack's work rate is 1 room per 11 hours, and Jessie's work rate is 1 room per 14.5 hours.

To determine their combined work rate, we can add their individual work rates:

1/11 + 1/14.5 = 0.0909 + 0.0690 = 0.1599 rooms per hour

Now, we can calculate the time it will take them to paint the room together by taking the reciprocal of their combined work rate:

1 / 0.1599 ≈ 6.25 hours

Therefore, it will take them approximately 6.25 hours (or 6 hours and 15 minutes) to paint the room together.