A carpenter was hired to build 192 window frames. The first day he made five frames and each day, thereafter he made two more frames than he made the day before. How many days did it take him to finish the job?
A carpenter was hired to build 192 window frames. The first day he made five frames and each day, thereafter he made two more frames than he made the day before. How many days did it take him to finish the job?

Solution:

It is given that on the day first he made five frames then 2 frames more than the previous i.e. 7 and then 9 and so on

Therefore the making of frames each day forms a sequence of 5, 7, 9…

Sequence so formed is an AP with $a=2$ as the first term as and $d = 2$ as the common difference

The total no. of frames that is to be made $= 192$

Let’s assume that the required days is n hence ${{S}_{n}}~=\text{ }192$

Sum of the first n terms of the AP so formed is given by ${{S}_{n~}}=\text{ }n/2\text{ }\left( 2a\text{ }+\text{ }\left( n{-}1 \right)\text{ }d \right)$

Where the first term is ‘a’ and the common difference is ‘d’

${{S}_{n~}}=\text{ }\left( n/2 \right)\text{ }\left( 2\left( 5 \right)\text{ }+\text{ }\left( n{-}1 \right)\text{ }2 \right)$

$192\text{ }=\text{ }\left( n/2 \right)\text{ }\left( 10\text{ }+\text{ }2n{-}2 \right)$

$\Rightarrow ~384\text{ }=\text{ }10n\text{ }+\text{ }2{{n}^{2}}{-}2n$

When we compute and simplify,  we obtain

$\Rightarrow ~2{{n}^{2}}~+\text{ }8n{-}384\text{ }=\text{ }0$

$\Rightarrow ~{{n}^{2}}~+\text{ }4n{-}192\text{ }=\text{ }0$

$\Rightarrow ~{{n}^{2}}~+\text{ }16n{-}12n{-}192\text{ }=\text{ }0$

$\Rightarrow ~n\text{ }\left( n\text{ }+\text{ }16 \right){-}12\text{ }\left( n\text{ }+\text{ }16 \right)\text{}=\text{ }0$

$\Rightarrow ~(n{-}12)\text{ }\left( n\text{ }+\text{ }16 \right)\text{ }=\text{ }0$

$\Rightarrow ~n\text{ }=\text{ }12\text{ }and\text{ }n\text{ }={-}16$

But here we know that ‘n’ represents the no. of days and that cannot be negative therefore $n = 12$

As a result, 12 days is required to finish the job.