Total journey time probabilities

Questions asking for probabilities about the total time across multiple independent journey stages (sum of normal variables).

6 questions

CAIE S2 2010 June Q6
6 Yu Ming travels to work and returns home once each day. The times, in minutes, that he takes to travel to work and to return home are represented by the independent random variables \(W\) and \(H\) with distributions \(\mathrm { N } \left( 22.4,4.8 ^ { 2 } \right)\) and \(\mathrm { N } \left( 20.3,5.2 ^ { 2 } \right)\) respectively.
  1. Find the probability that Yu Ming's total travelling time during a 5-day period is greater than 180 minutes.
  2. Find the probability that, on a particular day, Yu Ming takes longer to return home than he takes to travel to work.
CAIE S2 2018 November Q5
5 The times, in months, taken by a builder to build two types of house, \(P\) and \(Q\), are represented by the independent variables \(T _ { 1 } \sim \mathrm {~N} \left( 2.2,0.4 ^ { 2 } \right)\) and \(T _ { 2 } \sim \mathrm {~N} \left( 2.8,0.5 ^ { 2 } \right)\) respectively.
  1. Find the probability that the total time taken to build one house of each type is less than 6 months.
  2. Find the probability that the time taken to build a type \(Q\) house is more than 1.2 times the time taken to build a type \(P\) house.
CAIE S2 2020 Specimen Q4
4 marks
4 Tb lifetimes, in b s, 6 L ie lig \(\mathbf { b }\) b ad Ee rlw lig \(\mathbf { b }\) b \(\mathbf { b }\) \& tb id \(\mathbf { P } \mathbf { d }\) n id strib in \(\mathrm { N } \left( \mathrm { LS } ^ { 2 } \right)\) adN ( \(\mathrm { L } ^ { 2 }\) ) resp ctie ly.
  1. Fid th pb b lity th t to to al 6 th lifetimes 6 fie rach ly cb en \(L \mathbf { b }\) ie \(\mathbf { b }\) b is less th \(\mathrm { HB } \quad \mathrm { Ch } \quad \mathrm { S }\).
    [0pt] [4]
  2. Fid th pb b lity th tth lifetime 6 a rach lycb en En rlw b b is at least th ee times th t 6 a rach lyc b erL b ir b b
CAIE S2 2011 November Q6
6 Ranjit goes to mathematics lectures and physics lectures. The length, in minutes, of a mathematics lecture is modelled by the variable \(X\) with distribution \(\mathrm { N } \left( 36,3.5 ^ { 2 } \right)\). The length, in minutes, of a physics lecture is modelled by the independent variable \(Y\) with distribution \(\mathrm { N } \left( 55,5.2 ^ { 2 } \right)\).
  1. Find the probability that the total length of two mathematics lectures and one physics lecture is less than 140 minutes.
  2. Ranjit calculates how long he will need to spend revising the content of each lecture as follows. Each minute of a mathematics lecture requires 1 minute of revision and each minute of a physics lecture requires \(1 \frac { 1 } { 2 }\) minutes of revision. Find the probability that the total revision time required for one mathematics lecture and one physics lecture is more than 100 minutes.
OCR MEI S3 2006 June Q2
2 A bus route runs from the centre of town A through the town's urban area to a point B on its boundary and then through the country to a small town C . Because of traffic congestion and general road conditions, delays occur on both the urban and the country sections. All delays may be considered independent. The scheduled time for the journey from A to B is 24 minutes. In fact, journey times over this section are given by the Normally distributed random variable \(X\) with mean 26 minutes and standard deviation 3 minutes. The scheduled time for the journey from B to C is 18 minutes. In fact, journey times over this section are given by the Normally distributed random variable \(Y\) with mean 15 minutes and standard deviation 2 minutes. Journey times on the two sections of route may be considered independent. The timetable published to the public does not show details of times at intermediate points; thus, if a bus is running early, it merely continues on its journey and is not required to wait.
  1. Find the probability that a journey from A to B is completed in less than the scheduled time of 24 minutes.
  2. Find the probability that a journey from A to C is completed in less than the scheduled time of 42 minutes.
  3. It is proposed to introduce a system of bus lanes in the urban area. It is believed that this would mean that the journey time from A to B would be given by the random variable \(0.85 X\). Assuming this to be the case, find the probability that a journey from A to B would be completed in less than the currently scheduled time of 24 minutes.
  4. An alternative proposal is to introduce an express service. This would leave out some bus stops on both sections of the route and its overall journey time from A to C would be given by the random variable \(0.9 X + 0.8 Y\). The scheduled time from A to C is to be given as a whole number of minutes. Find the least possible scheduled time such that, with probability 0.75 , buses would complete the journey on time or early.
  5. A programme of minor road improvements is undertaken on the country section. After their completion, it is thought that the random variable giving the journey time from B to C is still Normally distributed with standard deviation 2 minutes. A random sample of 15 journeys is found to have a sample mean journey time from B to C of 13.4 minutes. Provide a two-sided \(95 \%\) confidence interval for the population mean journey time from B to C .
OCR MEI Further Statistics B AS 2019 June Q3
3 A bus runs from point A on the outskirts of a city, stops at point B outside the rail station, and continues to point C in the city centre.
The journey times for the sections A to B and B to C vary according to traffic conditions, and are modelled by independent Normal distributions with means and standard deviations as shown in the table.
\multirow{2}{*}{}Journey time (minutes)
\cline { 2 - 3 }MeanStandard deviation
A to B213
B to C294
  1. Find the probability that a randomly chosen journey from A to B takes less than the scheduled time of 23 minutes. For every journey, the bus stops for 1 minute when it reaches B to drop off and pick up passengers.
  2. Find the probability that a randomly chosen journey from A to C takes less than the scheduled time of 50 minutes. Mary travels on the bus from the station at B to her workplace at C every working day. You should assume that times for her bus journeys on different days are independent.
  3. Find the probability that the total time taken for her five journeys on the bus in a randomly chosen week is at least \(2 \frac { 1 } { 2 }\) hours.
  4. Comment on the assumption that times on different days are independent.