SOLUTION: Shelly can cut a lawn with a riding mower in 5 hours less time than it takes William to cut the lawn with a push mower. If they can cut the lawn in 5 hours working together, find

Question 196079: Shelly can cut a lawn with a riding mower in 5 hours less time than it takes William to cut the lawn with a push mower. If they can cut the lawn in 5 hours working together, find how long to the nearst tenth of an hour, it takes for William to cut the lawn alone.
Answer by josmiceli(19441) (Show Source): You can put this solution on YOUR website!
Their rates of mowing add to get their rate
working together
In words:
(number of lawns mowed by Shelly)/(time it takes Shelly to mow them) plus
(number of lawns mowed by William)/(time it takes William to mow them) equals
(number of lawns mowed by Shelly and william together)/(time to mow them)
Let Shelly's time to mow 1 lawn = hrs
Then William's time = hrs
Time mowing together = hrs
----------------------------------

Multiply both sides by

Solve by completing the square:

Take the square root of both sides

hrs
hrs
William's time mowing alone is 13.1 hrs
check answer:

close enough
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