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Only got one brainteaser throughout my entire interview process but I struggled with it for a little while: You have a cylinder that is 24 cm in circumference and 90cm high. If you wanted wrap a string around the cylinder five times moving up the cylinder (so you're just not wrapping it around five time at the base but rather escalating up the height of the clyinder), how long is your piece of string?
The answer is you have to unravel the cylinder, thus making it a rectangle. You have 24cm on your short end and 90 cm on the long end. Then split up the 90 into 5 pieces of 18cm. Draw a diagonal from the corner to your first marker of 18. Solve using the pythagorean theorem and multiply that number by 5 to represent the five times it is wrapped around the cylinder.
Another interesting one I've heard but was never asked: A king has a 1000 subjects who each hand him 1000 bars of gold each weighing a pound. However one of his subjects hands him 1000 bars of gold each weighing .9lbs. The king has a digital scale (not a balance) and can only use it once, how does he figure out who shorted him on the gold?
Answer: Easier to think about this for ten people and then apply it to a thousand. You place 1 bar from the first person who hande it to you to represent him, 2 bars from the second person to represent him, 3 bars from the third person and so on. Thus, when you get the total weight you can back out who shorted you. For example, if it was the first person in a ten person example and each bar is supposed to weigh 1lb, the total would be off by .1. If it was the tenth person, the weight would be off by a pound.
i think for the clasic clock one, each minute is 6 degrees so from the six to the 3 (:15) is 90 degrees, subtact two minutes and you have 78 degrees then you have to add the amount the hour hand moved, which is 17min/60min of 30 degrees.
so thats like 86.49 degrees?
Pretty simple, but still a fun one...
You are playing Russian Roulette, but (in this special version for bankers), there are 2 bullets in the gun (6-shooter). You survived your first pull of the trigger. Do you just pull the trigger again and hope for the best? Or do you spin the chamber and then shoot?
you spin again!
2/5 vs 1/3
Indeed. I'd rather have 1/3 chance of dying than 2/5. The question wasn't difficult, but the guy did play the extremely disappointed bad cop role quite well. Almost had me thinking I'd cocked up. Then again, he did that a few times during the interview. =)
how did u do it, please explain
2 bullets in 6 chambers = 2/6 or 1/3
if you shoot once you now have 2 bullets with 5 chambers left thus 2/5 chance of shooting yourself
2/5 (40%) is greater than 1/3 (33.33%) so you spin it again.
By the way, my answer during the interview was, "I'd give it to him (nodding at the other interviewer)." I hadn't quite understood the rules, and didn't fancy killing myself. They then proceeded to tell me that they weren't playing the game, and we had a good laugh. I then realised that it was a brain-teaser, and figured it out. =)
i think you missed a detail: the 2 bullets are in consecutive chambers. this changes the answer.
The question they asked me had the bullets in random chambers.
Assuming consecutive chambers makes it more of a brainteaser.
One interviewer asked me: "Why should we hire you for this position?" After a few minutes of trying to think of something, I slammed my first on the table, looked at him in the eyes, and said "Good question, let me get back to you."
I never did. I still don't know the answer to that question. Anyone have some thoughts on it? Thanks
1 2 3B 4B 5 6
2 to 1, live 1 to 6, live 6 to 5, live 5 to 4, die
1/4 vs 1/3
the vast majority of the brainteasers mentioned are in the vault guide.
Maybe not the exact same questions, but the same thought process just worded differently.
There are other books out there as well.
It's very rare that something truly new pops up.
You have 8 balls, 7 are heavy and 1 is light, or 7 are light and 1 is heavy. You have a scale and can only use it twice. How do you determine which ball is heavy or light?
How much money is spent on an average weekend by the undergraduate students?
How many ping pong balls can you fit in a 747?
How many donuts are sold in Manhattan on an average morning?
I got how many neckties are sold in the US in a year? How many gallons of house paint sold in the US in a year?
No right answers necessarily but you can't look like you don't know how to come up with an answer.
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