The ages of Old and Young total 48. Old is twice as old as Young was when Old was half as old as Young will be when Young is three times as old as Old was when Old was three times as old as Young.

How old is Old ?

(In reply to re: How do you do these? by TomM)

Two notes:

1)Some of the earlier solvers used fewer equations and fewer variables, and used elapsed time as a variable. They actually pre-combined my last three equations with the "main" five and substituted. The approach is basically the same, but is harder to follow if like Gamer, you have trouble following the word-puzzle form.

2) Lx and Yx in my next-to last sentence are the generic forms of the subscripted variables L1, L2, L3, L4, and Y1, Y2, Y3, and Y4.

Posted by TomM on 2003-05-26 19:10:37