Question

A board is 20 inches long. It must be cut into four pieces of equal length, and each of the three cuts will cause a waste of 1/2 inches. How long will each piece be after the Cuts are made

Answer 1

Let the length of each cut be x.

Therefore, the following equation holds true:

$4x+3(\frac{1}{2})=20$

Therefore,

$\begin{gathered} 4x=20-\frac{3}{2}=18.5 \\ x=4.625\text{ inches} \end{gathered}$

Therefore, the required length is 4.625