TITLE: Do all natural numbers have a nonzero multiple that is a palindrome in base 10?
QUESTION [38 upvotes]: Some natural numbers have a nonzero multiple that is a palindrome in base 10.  For example, $106 \times 2 = 212$, which is a palindrome, and $29 \times 8 = 232$, which is also a palindrome.
Aside from 0 (which only has 0 as a multiple), are there any natural numbers that are definitively known to not have a multiple that is a palindrome?
I'm curious about this because I teach a theory of computation course and on the final exam asked students to show that the set of all natural numbers with this property is Turing-recognizable.  However, I honestly have no idea what numbers are in this set, and was wondering if this was a known open problem or if the solution was known.
Thanks!

REPLY [20 votes]: If $n$ is a multiple of $10$, it cannot have any multiple which is a palidrome.
Otherwise, $n$ is divisible by 2 but not 5, OR by 5 but not 2 OR is relatively prime to $10$.

Any number $n$ which is relatively prime to $10$ has a multiple which can be written only with 1, and a simple proof can be found here:

A natural number multiplied by some integer results in a number with only ones and zeros

If $2|n$ but $5 \nmid n$. Let $k$ be the power of $2$ in n. Then $n=2^kn_0$ where $n_0$ is relatively prime to $10$. Let $m$ be the "backwards" $n$, that is the digits of $n$ written backwards. For example, if $n=124$ then $m=421$.

Consider the numbers $m, mm,mmm, ..,mmm..m$ obtained by writing $m$ after n$
[for example if $n=124$ then $m=421$ and I am looking at the set 
$$\{ 421, 421421, 421421421 ,...\} \,]$$
By the pigeon hole principle, two numbers in our set have the same remainder when divided by $n_0$, thus their difference $mmmm00000.000$ is divisible by $n_0$. In particular, since $n_0$ is relatively prime to 10, $n_0$ divides $mmmm..m$.
Hence the number 
$$mmmm..m0000000n..nnnn$$
is a palidrome, and it is a multiple of $n$ whenever $$mmmm..m0000000n..nnnn-nnnn.n=mmm...m0000000.00000$$ contains at least $k$ zeroes at the end.

If $5|n$ but $2 \nmid n$. Let $k$ be the power of $5$ in n. Then $n=5^kn_0$ where $n_0$ is relatively prime to $10$.

Repeat the argument above.
P.S. The entire argument is based on the following observation: if $m$ is any combination of digits, and $n$ is relatively prime to $10$, then $n$ has a multiple of the form $mmmm...mmm$ [repetition, not multiplication]....
This is basically proven above, but it is proven exactly as in the link provided.
P.P.S. To sum it up, if $n$ is not a multiple of $10$ it has a multiple which is a palidrome. If $n$ is a multiple of $10$, if interested, you can prove the same way that $n$ has a multiple which is of the form palidrome followed by zeroes....