Question

There are two red jars of marbles and one blue jar of marbles jars of a certain color have the same number of marbles in them. There are 41 marbles in total. The difference between the number of marbles in a red jar and the number of marbles in a blue jar is 16. Find the numbers of marbles in each type of jar.

Answer 1

We can set up an equation to solve this problem.  I am setting the number of marbles in a red jar to R.

R + R + R - 16 = 41

We solve this by adding 16 to both sides and combining all of the R terms..  This gives us:

3R = 57

We can finish this problem by dividing both sides by 3.

R = 19.  So, there are 19 marbles in a red jar.

We can easily figure out how many marbles are in a blue jar by subtracting the total amount of marbles in 2 red jars from the total amount of marbles.  I am setting the amount of marbles in a blue jar to B.

41 - 19*2 = B

B = 3

So, there are 3 marbles in a blue jar and 19 marbles in a red jar.