Question

Harvey plans to use 5 ft of shelving for four shelves whose lengths are to be a series of consecutive even numbers. How many inches long should each shelf be?

If x represents the length of the shortest shelf, which expression would represent the length of the longest shelf?
x + 3
x + 4
x + 6

Answer 1

Four consecutive even integers are n, n+2, n+4, n+6 and the sum must be 5*12=60 inches so:

n+n+2+n+4+n+6=60

4n+12=60

4n=48

n=12 inches

So the lengths of the shelves are:

12, 14, 16, 18 inches respectively.

The longest shelf was x+6