Puzzle 17
What number comes next in this sequence:
1 · 4 · 8 · 13 · 21 · 30 · 36 · ?
Puzzle Copyright © Kevin Stone
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Hint
Try writing the numbers out as letters.
Answer
45.
Reasoning
Each term increases by the number of letters in the previous term (ignoring any hyphens).
1 + length("ONE") = 4
4 + length("FOUR") = 8
8 + length("EIGHT") = 13
13 + length("THIRTEEN") = 21
21 + length("TWENTYONE") = 30
30 + length("THIRTY") = 36
36 + length("THIRTYSIX") = 45
Puzzle 18
Can you find three consecutive prime numbers …
… that equal 409,457 when multiplied together?
Puzzle Copyright © Kevin Stone
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Hint
The cube root of the given number is a good starting point.
Answer
71, 73, 79.
Reasoning
The cube root of 409,457 is around 74.
The closest consecutive prime numbers to 74 are: 61, 67, 71, 73, 79, 83, 89, 97.
Using a calculator, it is quickly seen that the answer can only be found using 71, 73 and 79.
Puzzle 19
hwayetritipzl
omnltesnhsuze
Puzzle Copyright © Kevin Stone
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Hint
The puzzle contains the question.
Answer
26.
Reasoning
The puzzle reads 'how many letters in this puzzle'.
The puzzle's letters alternate between the top and bottom lines.
Puzzle 20
Imagine a bottle recycling skip, empty other than one lonely bottle.
Every hour, on the hour, people come and put bottles into the skip.
The first hour, at noon, one person came and put a bottle in.
One hour later, two people each placed a bottle into the skip.
An hour later, four people each placed a bottle into the skip.
This doubling of people continued until 11pm, when the skip was finally full.
When was the skip exactly half full?
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Hint
Remember that the bottle count doubles each time.
Answer
10pm.
Reasoning
The skip started with 1 lonely bottle.
At Noon: 1 person came along and added a bottle, making the total 2 bottles.
At 1pm: 2 people came along and each added a bottle, making the total 2 + 2 = 4 bottles.
At 2pm: 4 people came along and each added a bottle, making the total 4 + 4 = 8 bottles.
At 3pm: 8 people came along and each added a bottle, making the total 8 + 8 = 16 bottles.
Therefore, the number of bottles in the skip is doubling every hour, as it was full at 11pm, it must have been half full at 10pm.