document.write( "Question 740890: The coffee merchant wants to blend a mildly strong coffee called Nervous Nellie with an extremely strong coffee called Nervous Breakdown to create a medium strength coffee he plans to call Nervous Wreck. If the Nellie flavor costs $1.20 per pound and the Breakdown flavor costs $1.40 per pound, how many pounds of the Nellie is needed to create a 30 pound blend which costs $1.35 per pound?
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Algebra.Com's Answer #852623 by greenestamps(13258) $\"\"$ $\"About$

You can put this solution on YOUR website!

\n" ); document.write( "The response from tutor @ikleyn shows a standard formal algebraic solution for mixture problems like this.

\n" ); document.write( "You can also solve this or any similar mixture problem using the idea of weighted averages; the problem can be solved quickly with simple mental arithmetic if the numbers in the problem are \"nice\".

\n" ); document.write( "In this problem the price per pound of the mixture is 3/4 of the way from the lower price to the higher price; that means 3/4 of the mixture must be the more expensive ingredient.

\n" ); document.write( "3/4 of 30 pounds is 22.5 pounds, so the mixture must contain 22.5 pounds of the Breakdown flavor, which means 30-22.5 = 7.5 pounds of the Nellie flavor.

\n" ); document.write( "ANSWER: 7.5 pounds

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