While working at The Nut House you are asked to make a mixture of raisins and nuts worth $2.75/lb. You have 12 pounds of raisins worth $1.25/lb. How many pounds of nuts worth $4.00/lb should you add to the raisins to get the right-priced mix?

Question

I have no idea how to solve this. I am terrible at word problems.

Answer 1

first we represent the unknown using variable,
let x = pounds of nuts needed
then we set up equation. since we are given the number of pounds of raisins and its price per pound, we'll multiply it to get the total amount of the 12-lb raisins. we do the same for the the nuts,, this time we multiply x by the price of nut per pound which is 4 :
12*1.25 + 4x = 2.75*(12+x)
note that we multiply 2.75 by 12+x since mixture of nut and raisin,, solving for x,
15 + 4x = 33 + 2.75x
4x - 2.75x = 33 - 15
1.25x = 18
x = 14.4 lb of nuts

hope this helps~ :)

Answer 2

21