document.write( "Question 163951This question is from textbook College Algebra
\n" ); document.write( ": A rental company charges $65 a day and 30 cents a mile for renting a truck. Michael rents a truck for 3 days, and his bill comes to $275. How many miles did he drive?
\n" ); document.write( "I can figure out that the answer is 400 miles, but I don't know how to put it in an algebraic equation form.
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Algebra.Com's Answer #120799 by Edwin McCravy(20055) $\"\"$ $\"About$

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A rental company charges $65 a day and 30 cents a mile for renting a truck. Michael rents a truck for 3 days, and his bill comes to $275. How many miles did he drive?
\n" ); document.write( "I can figure out that the answer is 400 miles, but I don't know how to put it in an algebraic equation form.
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document.write( "400 miles cannot be correct, for 30 cents times \r\n" );
document.write( "400 miles gives $120. And $65 times 3 days gives $195. \r\n" );
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document.write( "But adding $195 + $120 gives $315, not $275.\r\n" );
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document.write( "Just think how the total bill was figured.  It was this way:\r\n" );
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document.write( "1.  $65 TIMES THE NUMBER OF DAYS \r\n" );
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document.write( "PLUS \r\n" );
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document.write( "2.  $0.30 TIMES THE NUMBER OF MILES\r\n" );
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document.write( "EQUALS\r\n" );
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document.write( "3.  THE TOTAL BILL \r\n" );
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document.write( "Let's look at 1.  That's $65 times 3 days or $195.\r\n" );
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document.write( "Let's look at 2.  We don't know the number of miles, so we let\r\n" );
document.write( "the letter x represent this unknown number.  But we can\r\n" );
document.write( "multiply $.30 by x anyway and get $.30x\r\n" );
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document.write( "Let's look at 3.  That's given as $275.\r\n" );
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document.write( "So we have\r\n" );
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document.write( "$195 PLUS $.30x EQUALS $275\r\n" );
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document.write( "or dropping the dollar signs, and using + for PLUS and = \r\n" );
document.write( "for EQUALS:\r\n" );
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document.write( "195 + .30x = 275\r\n" );
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document.write( "Now we subtract 195 from both sides:\r\n" );
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document.write( "      .30x = 80\r\n" );
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document.write( "Now we divide both sides by .30\r\n" );
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document.write( "       \r\n" );
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document.write( "So it's not 400 miles, it's 266.67 miles.\r\n" );
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document.write( "Edwin

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