When Carla looked out at the school parking lot, she noticed that for every 2 minivans, there were 5 other types of vehicles. If there are 39 vehicles in the parking lot, how many of them are not minivans?
I am confused on how to solve this problem. I need help solving the problem.
m = minivans
p = other (what we want
p = (5/2) m or m = 2 p/5
m + p = 39
2 p/5 + 5 p/5 = 39
7 p/5 = 39
well, you are not going to get a whole number of vehicles
To solve this problem, you need to set up a proportion based on the given information.
Let's represent the number of minivans as 'm' and the number of other types of vehicles as 'o'.
Based on the information provided, we know that for every 2 minivans, there are 5 other types of vehicles. This can be written as:
2 minivans / 5 other types of vehicles
Since the ratio represents the relationship between minivans and other types of vehicles, it should be equal to the ratio of their actual numbers in the parking lot.
So, you can set up the proportion:
2 minivans / 5 other types of vehicles = m minivans / o other types of vehicles
Now, let's solve the proportion:
2 / 5 = m / o
To solve for 'o', we need to find the value of 'm'.
From the question, we know that there are 39 vehicles in total, so we can set up another equation:
m + o = 39
Substituting the value of 'm' in terms of 'o' from the proportion equation:
2 / 5 = (39 - o) / o
Now, cross multiply:
2o = 5(39 - o)
Simplifying:
2o = 195 - 5o
Combining like terms:
7o = 195
Divide both sides by 7:
o = 27.86 (rounded to the nearest whole number)
Since it doesn't make sense to have a fraction of a vehicle, we know the number of 'o' must be a whole number. Therefore, we can assume that there are 27 other types of vehicles in the parking lot.
To calculate the number of minivans, we can substitute the value of 'o' back into the equation:
m + 27 = 39
Simplifying:
m = 12
So, there are 12 minivans in the parking lot.
To find the number of vehicles that are not minivans, subtract the number of minivans from the total number of vehicles:
39 - 12 = 27
Therefore, there are 27 vehicles that are not minivans in the parking lot.