Richard is thrice as old as Alvin. The sum of their ages is 52 years. Find their ages

Discussion in 'Calculator Requests' started by math_celebrity, Dec 11, 2018.

  1. math_celebrity

    math_celebrity Administrator Staff Member

    Richard is thrice as old as Alvin. The sum of their ages is 52 years. Find their ages.

    Let r be Richard's age. And a be Alvin's age. We have:

    1. r = 3a
    2. a + r = 52
    Substitute (1) into (2)
    a + 3a = 52

    Group like terms:
    4a = 52

    Typing this into the search engine, we get a = 13.

    This means Richard is 3(13) = 39
     

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