SOLUTION: There were some red yellow and blue toy cars in a box. 3/8 of the toy cars were red and 26 were blue. The rest were yellow. If there were 12 fewer yellow toy cars than blue toy car

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Question 1187316: There were some red yellow and blue toy cars in a box. 3/8 of the toy cars were red and 26 were blue. The rest were yellow. If there were 12 fewer yellow toy cars than blue toy cars, how many red toy cars were there.
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Found 2 solutions by josgarithmetic, ikleyn:
Answer by josgarithmetic(39620) About Me  (Show Source):
You can put this solution on YOUR website!
This is incomplete work but enough for you to figure what to do. 
RED        r

YELLOW     y

BLUE      26

Total  r+y+26

system%28r%2F%28r%2By%2B26%29=3%2F8%2C+AND+%2C26-y=12%29
.
.
.
system%28y=14%2Cand%2C+highlight%28r=24%29%29

Answer by ikleyn(52812) About Me  (Show Source):
You can put this solution on YOUR website!
.
There were some red, yellow, and blue toy cars in a box.
3/8 of the toy cars were red and 26 were blue. The rest were yellow.
If there were 12 fewer yellow toy cars than blue toy cars, how many red toy cars were there?
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Read the condition attentively.


26 cars were blue and 12 fewer than blue were yellow: so there were 26-12 = 14 yellow cars.


The blue cars PLUS yellow cars comprise  26 + 14  = 40 cars, and this amount is  1+-+3%2F8 = 5/8 of the total number of cars.


Hence, 1/8  of the total cars is  40:5 = 8.  


THEREFORE, the number of RED cars is three times 8, which is 3*8 = 24.    ANSWER

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This problem admits easy mental solution,  without using any equations.

So,  it  SHOULD  be solved by the simplest way,  as the common sense dictates it . . .