SOLUTION: Constructing Equations How do you construct this word problem as an equation? Patrick has 15 bicycles and tricycles to sell. Altogether, there are 35 wheels on the bicycles a

Question 262398: Constructing Equations
How do you construct this word problem as an equation?
Patrick has 15 bicycles and tricycles to sell. Altogether, there are 35 wheels on the bicycles and tricycles. How many of each cycle does Patrick have to sell?
Found 2 solutions by drk, solver91311:
Answer by drk(1908) (Show Source): You can put this solution on YOUR website!
Let B = bike and T = tricycles
we have
(i)
(ii)
step 1 - multiply (i) by -2 to get
(iii)
add (ii) and (iii) to get
(iv)
and now

Answer by solver91311(24713) (Show Source): You can put this solution on YOUR website!

Let represent the number of bicycles and let represent the number of tricycles. Then the number of bicycle wheels is and the number of tricycle wheels is .

Using what we know:

Solve the system. Substitution is probably the easiest method for this problem.

Actually, you can save a step by changing the setup a little.

Let represent the number of bicycles as before. But since we know that there are 15 cycles altogether, we can say the number of tricycles is . That means the number of bicycle wheels is again , but the number of tricycle wheels is

Now all you need is one equation:

John

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