SOLUTION: Scott is 4 times older than Bethany. In six years from now Scott will only be 3 times older than Bethany. solve equations to find out how old each of them is

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Question 1082959: Scott is 4 times older than Bethany. In six years from now Scott will only be 3 times older than Bethany. solve equations to find out how old each of them is

Found 2 solutions by josgarithmetic, ikleyn:
Answer by josgarithmetic(39620)   (Show Source): You can put this solution on YOUR website!
s, Scott
b, Bethany
,


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Answer by ikleyn(52798)   (Show Source): You can put this solution on YOUR website!
.
Scott is 4 times older than Bethany. In six years from now Scott will only be 3 times older than Bethany.
solve equations to find out how old each of them is
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 

Let S be the Scott's present age and B be the Bethany's present age.

Then you have this system of two equations

S = 4B              (1)
S + 6 = 3*(B+6)     (2)

From (1), substitute the expression S = 4B into equation (2). You will get

4B + 6 = 3*(B+6),

4B + 6 = 3B + 18  ---->  B = 12.

Thus Bethany is 12 years old now.

Then Scott is 12*4 = 48 years old now.


You can easily check that this solution satisfies the condition.

Solved.

The solution by "josgarithmetic" is WRONG.


There is a bunch of lessons on age word problems
    - Age problems and their solutions
    - A fresh formulation of a traditional age problem
    - Really intricate age word problem
    - Selected age word problems from the archive
in this site.

Read them and become an expert in solving age problems.

Also, you have this free of charge online textbook in ALGEBRA-I in this site
    - ALGEBRA-I - YOUR ONLINE TEXTBOOK.

The referred lessons are the part of this online textbook under the topic "Age word problems".



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