Given the Diophantine equation,
$$x_1^k+x_2^k+x_3^k = y_1^k+y_2^k+y_3^k\tag1$$
there is the rather curious observation that the smallest positive solutions for $k=5$ or $6$ is multi-grade.
$$24^k+28^k+67^k=3^k+54^k+62^k,\quad k = 1,5$$
$$15^k + 10^k + 23^k = 3^k + 19^k + 22^k,\quad k = 2,6$$
Duncan Moore has exhaustively searched $(1)$ for all positive solutions below a bound. Table 1 is for $k=5$, while Table 2 is for $k=6$. We summarize the data below.
I. Table 1:
$$\begin{array}{|c|c|c||} \text{# of solns}&\color{blue}{A:=\text{(% of}\; k = 1,5)}&\text{diff}\\ 168&63.7\text{%}& \\ 336&65.8\text{%}&+2.7\\ 672&65.6\text{%}&-0.3 \\ 1344&63.6\text{%}&-2.0\\ 2688&61.0\text{%}&-2.6\\ 5376&59.1\text{%}&-1.9\\ \end{array}$$
Note: Each row doubles the $\text{#}$. Since Moore's database has $5393$ solns, and $5393/2^5\approx168$, then that's where I started.
II. Table 2:
$$\begin{array}{|c|c|c|} \text{# of solns}&\color{blue}{B:=\text{(% of}\; k = 2,6)}&\text{diff}\\ 50&80\text{%}& \\ 100&85\text{%}&+5.0\\ 200&89\text{%}&+4.0\\ 400&91.7\text{%}&+2.7\\ \end{array}$$
Questions:
- Why is the percentage of $A$ decreasing, while that of $B$ is apparently increasing? Or will $B$ eventually have a negative diff like $A$? (The data is too small to be conclusive.)
- If both are decreasing, will $A,B \to 0$? Or will it taper off to some constant?
P.S. This answer to a related post might be informative. Incidentally, the smallest solutions to,
$$x_1^k+x_2^k+x_3^k+x_4^k = y_1^k+y_2^k+y_3^k+x_4^k\tag2$$
are also multigrades as $k=1,5$, and $k=2,6$, though there are no exhaustive tables for these.