Clock, calculator, bulb puzzle

Can you find the answer to this puzzle? For some fun, for the first 24 hours, please put your answer in a spoiler.

??

Nice start. So far, Rog, Michele and manxman have the correct answer. The rest of you can try again!

Edit: Oops! I think my lightbulbs are incorrect.

Sneaky but good!

Attempt #2



(And I learned how to properly use the spoiler tag!)

LadyK on your second try!

oldbroad, as LadyK said, "It's all in the details." Take another stab at it.

Attempt #3:

Not there yet. There are several details to pay attention to.

I think I can come up with a few more answers. Give me time .

Let's try:

This is a bit of a spoiler, but may help those still floundering: I had eventually spotted the alterations to the calculator and bulbs, but I was forgetting the mathematical rules of the road about priority between calculations - another Denisian puzzle!

Exactly, Lex.

oldbroad, take as much time as you need!

Lex, it's definitely about paying attention to details but you're also correct in that order of operations applies here.

Yeah, I don't know. I think I give up though I'm not looking at any of the right answers yet in case I feel smarter a little later on .

For those still puzzled by this puzzle, here's the solution:

The clock = 9
The calculator = 9 (look closely at the numbers - 1224)
The lightbulbs = 36 (each ray is worth 3, there are 4 rays on each bulb so 3x12)
The equation: 9 + 9 x 36 = 333 (order of operations says to multiply first - 9 x 36 = 324 + 9)

Thank you. I got all the numbers but I've never heard of the "order of operations says to multiply first" and I was an A++ math student way, way back (unless there were parenthesis involved)! Or, maybe I should say that I don't recall that part.

OB, way, way back in school when I (we?) went, parentheses were used. So, the problem would have
read either (x + y) x z, or x + (y x z). They added those "rules" much later, leaving out the much needed
parentheses and forcing students to remember the rules.

I think that we were taught to add the brackets as appropriate when they had been omitted as part of the mathematical problem - like OB I scored quite well at maths in school, although I was rather stumped when we moved on from calculus to integration (not helped by having a teacher who was a mathematical genius but impatient with the mere mortals in his classroom!)

We had the word BODMAS drilled into us -

Brackets
Of (eg 50% of 128)
Division
Multiplication
Addition
Subtraction

Never ever forgot it...

I don't remember what I was taught in school growing up. The middle school I worked at for 15+ years taught something similar to what Rog was taught:

Parentheses (includes brackets)
Exponents
Multiplication
Division
Addition
Subtraction

My math skills were weak in school, but I did manage to dredge up the multiplication rule from somewhere in the depths of my brain.

Thanks everyone. I am going with what Redz wrote and saying that, that is my problem ("They added those "rules" much later, leaving out the much needed
parentheses and forcing students to remember the rules.") That's my story and I'm sticking to it!!

I absolutely LOVED algebra, but I cannot remember a thing about it anymore. I have no children or grandchildren to try to help (or to be teaching me) so...