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Maths Week: The solutions to all of the puzzles

Tens of thousands of you took our mathematical challenge all week. Here are the answers.

THIS HAS BEEN Maths Week and if you’ve clicked in here, you are likely to have been puzzling over our fiendish maths challenges on TheJournal.ie all week.

So let’s not delay further: these are the answers you’ve been waiting for.

Let us know how you did in the comments…

Saturday: The One With The Questions To Test Your Skills

The answers: 

1) 24

2) €12

3) €2

4) 15 mins

5) 3 for the price of 2

6) 24

7) 16

8) Glass of wine (24 ml of alcohol)

9) 12.775 kg of sugar

10) 30 mins

Sunday: The One About The New Road Network Around Ireland

Answer: It is possible to start in Dublin and visit all the cities and towns shown in the diagram and only have to drive 1000km.

The method:

If you drive the following routes, you will travel 1000km between Dublin and the cities and towns.

  • Dublin – Belfast: 165km
  • Belfast – Sligo: 190km
  • Sligo – Athlone: 105km
  • Athlone – Galway: 90km
  • Galway – Cork: 170km
  • Cork – Waterford: 115km
  • Waterford – Dublin: 165km

TOTAL: 1000km 

Monday: No puzzle today because of Storm Ophelia

Tuesday: The One With The Pentominos

The answer: Pentimonos (a), (b), (c), (d), (e), (h), (i) can be folded into an open box

pentomino

Wednesday: The One Where You Had To Get To 24 And 23 Using 2,4,6,8 And The Common Operators

The answer: There are several ways of getting a total of 24. Here is one:

(2×6)/4×8=24

Getting to 23 is much harder:

(6 -2/8)×4=23

Here’s how that breaks down: (6 -2/8)×4=(6-1/4)×4=(5 3/4)×4=23

Getting 1000 from 8,8,8,8,8,8,8,8, is trickier because it requires a bit of a trick:

888+88+8+8+8=1000

Thursday: The One That Involved Moving The Lions and Tigers 

The answer: The shortest number of steps to get the animals into the correct cages is 16 moves

sMZYZICEODJkpf1X8OVi3zQ

Friday: The One Where You Had To Figure Out How Much Money Was In The Bag

The answer: The amount of money in the bag is €300. Twenty €5 notes, ten €10 notes and five €20 notes.

Saturday: The One With The Gamble On The Euro Coins

The answer: It is not generous of you. It gives you twice the chance of winning. The possible outcomes are:

possibilities

See all of the Maths Week puzzles here > 

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