Toaster Math

Your old-fashioned toaster has hinged doors on its two sides. It holds two pieces of bread at once but toasts each of them on one side only. To toast both sides it is necessary to open the doors and reverse the slices.

It takes three seconds to put a slice of bread into the toaster, three seconds to take it out, and three seconds to reverse a slice without removing it. Both hands are required for each of these operations, which means that it is not possible to put in, take out, or turn two slices simultaneously. The toasting time for one side of a piece of bread is thirty seconds. It takes twelve seconds to butter a slice.

Each slice is buttered on one side only. No side may be buttered until it has been toasted. A slice toasted and buttered on one side may be returned to the toaster for toasting on its other side. The toaster is warmed up at the start.



In how short a time can three slices of bread be toasted on both sides and buttered?

***Please put your response in a spoiler tag so others won't see your solution***

I'm familiar with this one, so will not post
solution cause I know it!

Couple questions aimed at further reducing time:

If you cut a slice in half and put a half on
each side of toaster, will the toasting be in
15 seconds...or still 30 seconds?

Are you allowed to put the butter close to
toaster so the heat from toaster softens it,
thus cutting down the 12 seconds buttering

All I know is toast always lands on the floor buttered side down.

Right!
And if you drop a cat from some height, it
always lands on its feet.

SO: tie a toast buttered side up to the back
of a cat, and drop the cat from some height,
whadda heck will happen?

CanukDenis-I don't know,sounds like something against nature and could involve dark matter or something like that. I think only Steven Hawkings can answer that question.

Hmmm...I like the idea of putting the butter closer to the toaster thus cutting down on the length of time to butter the toast



Ah, that's an easy one ... the cat will be extremely mad!