Question

A carpenter has several boards of equal length. He cuts 3/5 of each board. After cutting the boards, the carpenter notices that he has enough pieces left over to make up the same length as 4 of the original boards. How many boards did the carpenter start with?

Answer 1

To answer his question you will consider that you have 4 whole pieces. If the remaining part is 2/5 (1 - 3/5 = 2/5), that you will need to figure out how many groups of 2/5 it takes to make 4. You get this answer by dividing 4 by 2/5. The answer is 10. You started with 10 pieces.