SOLUTION: I cannot understand how to even start this problem. Each car in a fleet of 24 rental cars is either red or blue. There are 3 more blue cars than twice the number of red ones. H

Question 7997: I cannot understand how to even start this problem.
Each car in a fleet of 24 rental cars is either red or blue. There are 3 more blue cars than twice the number of red ones. How many red ones are there?
Found 2 solutions by CharStar, Earlsdon:
Answer by CharStar(110) (Show Source): You can put this solution on YOUR website!
Since you don't know how many red cars there are, Red is X.
Since you do know how many blue cars there are, Blue is 2x+3 (twice red X plus 3)
The total cars is 24.
The equation is:
Factor the equation
Subtract 3 from both sides

Red x= 7
Blue 2(7)+3= 17
Total = 24
I hope that helps you
CharStar
Answer by Earlsdon(6294) (Show Source): You can put this solution on YOUR website!
Well, you can always start by assigning variables to the quantities you are trying to find.
Let B = the number of blue cars and R = the number of red cars.
Now you have to translate the words of the problem into algebraic statements.
The fleet of red and blue cars is 24 cars. So, R + B = 24
There are 3 more (add 3 to)blue cars than twice (2 times) the number of red cars. Or, B + 3 = 2R
Now we have a system of two equations that we need to solve, Since the problem asks only for the number of red cars, we'll try and solve for R.
R + B = 24
B + 3 = 2R Rewrite this as: B = 2R - 3 and substitute into the first equation.
R + (2R - 3) = 24 Simplify and solve for R.
3R - 3 = 24 Add 3 to both sides.
3R = 27 Divide both sides by 3.
R = 9 There are 9 red cars.
If you wanted to find out how many blue cars there are, take 24 - 9 = 15 blue cars.
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