Hint
How many large pipes are required to drain the reservoir in 24 hours?
Answer
21 hours and 36 minutes.
Reasoning
Looking at the first clue:
in 12 hours, 6 large pipes can drain 1 reservoir
in 24 hours, 6 large pipes can drain 2 reservoirs
(*) in 24 hours, 3 large pipes can drain 1 reservoir
Looking at the second clue:
in 8 hours, 3 large + 9 small pipes can drain 1 reservoir
in 24 hours, 3 large + 9 small pipes can drain 3 reservoirs
But, by (*), we know that in those 24 hours, 3 large pipes can drain 1 of those reservoirs.
Therefore, the other 2 reservoirs can be drained by the small pipes on their own:
in 24 hours, 9 small pipes can drain 2 reservoirs
in 24 hours, 1 small pipe can drain 2/9 reservoirs
multiply the hours by 9:
in 216 hours, 1 small pipe can drain 2 reservoirs
in 216 hours, 5 small pipes can drain 10 reservoirs
divide the hours by 10:
in 21.6 hours, 5 small pipes can drain 1 reservoir
