Simple Ratio Question - What is wrong with my approach?

Question

A zoo has twice as many zebras as lions and four times as many monkeys as zebras

Their total is a multiple of ? (The answer is 11 but my solution gets me 13)

Here is how I'm solving it:

Z=2(L) -> [1]

M=4(Z) -> [2]

Multiply equation [1] by 4 to have the same value factor for Z

4Z=8(L) -> [3]

From [2] and [3] we have the following ratio

M:Z:L

1:4:8

1x+4x+8x= 13x which makes the answer a multiple of 13 (I'm not getting 11)

Answer 1

$M:Z:L = 1:4:8$ implies that $M:Z=1:4$, when in fact, you should have $M:Z=4:1$! There are more monkeys than zebras!

The mistake you made is that from the equations $$M=4Z\\ 4Z=8L$$ You then went to $M:Z:L=1:4:8$ which is false. $4Z=8L$ actually means that $Z:L = 8:4$, not the other way around!

Remember, if $ax = by$, then $x:y = b:a$, since $\frac xy=\frac ba$!

Answer 2

For one lion, there is $2$ zebras and thus $8$ monkeys. Therefore, the total number of animals is $(1+2+8)*L$, where L is the number of lions. Hence the total number of animals is always a multiple of $11$.

From [2] and [3] we have the following ratio

M:Z:L

1:4:8

1x+4x+8x= 13x which makes the answer a multiple of 13 (I'm not getting 11)

Here is the suspicious thing: you say that you have $M=4Z=8L$, which is true, but the total number of animals isn't $1x+4x+8x= 13x$; it is $L+M+Z$, which is equal to $L+8L+4L=11L$.