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Sunday Times Teaser 3120 – Bus Stop Blues

by BRG on July 8, 2022

by Susan Bricket

Published Sunday July 17 2022 {link)

While waiting for buses, I often look out for interesting number plates on passing cars. From 2001 the UK registration plate format has been 2 letters + a 2-digit number + 3 more letters, the digits being last two of the year of registration with 50 added after six months (for example in 2011, the possible numbers were 11 and 61). I spotted one recently with its five letters in alphabetical order, all different and with no vowels. Looking more closely, I saw that if their numerical positions in the alphabet (A = 1, B = 2 etc.) were substituted for the 5 letters, their sum plus 1 was the 2-digit number and the sum of their reciprocals was equal to 1.

Send the 7-character registration.

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4 Comments Leave one →
  1. Brian Gladman permalink

    Very straightforward this week.

  2. Frits permalink

    Using Brian’s decompose() function of enigma 501.

  3. John Z. permalink

    Too cheap? Too dirty?

  4. John Z permalink

    Variation on theme avoiding floating point operations

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