A widget weighs 1 ounce. Five hundred fifty widgets fit into a box. Thirty six boxes of widgets fit on a skid.

Question

 widget weighs 1 ounce. Five hundred fifty widgets fit into a box. Thirty six boxes of widgets fit on a skid. How many pounds of widgets are on a full skid of widgets?

Answer 1

The first step is to see how much one box weighs.

 

550 widgets x 1 oz = 550 oz (per box)

 

Now we take the weight of that one box and multiply it to see how much a skid weighs.

 

550 oz x 36 boxes = 19,800 oz (per skid)

 

Since the questions calls for pounds not ounces, we must now convert the answer. (Remember that 1 lb = 16 oz.)

 

19,800 / 16 = 1,237.5 lbs

Answer 2

Begin by calculating the number of widgets in the skid.  500 widgets to a box and 30 boxes to a skid means 500*30 = 15,000 widgets. Since each is an ounce, this means there are 15,000 ounces.  Finally since there are 16 ounces in one pound, divide 15,000 by 16 to find the number of pounds that there are on a full skid of widgets.

 

Edit: I  can't believe I missed that it was 550 widgets per box.  Apologies, but I'll leave my previous answer unchanged as the general steps are exactly the same.