A manufacturer of bathroom fixtures produces fiberglass bathtubs in an assembly operation consisting of three processes: molding, smoothing, and painting. The number of units that can be put through each process in an hour is as follows:
Process Output (units/hr)
Molding ..............7
Smoothing ............12
Painting .............10
The labor costs per hour are $8 for molding, $5 for smoothing, and $6.50 for painting. The company’s labor budget is $3000 per week. A total of 120 hours of labor is available for all three processes per week. Each completed bathtub requires 90 pounds of fiberglass, and the company has a total of 10,000 pounds of fiberglass available each week. Each bathtub earns a profit of $175. The manager of the company wants to know how many hours per week to run each process in order to maximize profit. Formulate and solve a linear programming model for this problem.