How many ways are there to put 6 boxes in 3 crates if the boxes are distinguishable but the crates are not?
You can think of this as a 3 digit number in base 6. Each digit represents how many boxes in that crate.
There are
63=216
combinations, however they aren't all distinguishable. As there are 3 crates any given distribution of the boxes into crates is indistinguishable within a group of 3! other distributions.
For example 312 is indistinguishable from
123, 132, 213, 231, 321
So the final number is
2163!=2166=36
.