A child sits on one side of a teeter totter of length 7.60 m, a distance of 49.7 cm away from the end of the beam. The child has a mass of 21.6 kg. Her mother has a mass of 43.6 kg. How far away from her end does she have to sit in order for the teeter tooter to be exactly balanced?

Answer 1

Is the center of the board located as the fulcrum. If so, then distance from center to child*child's mass = distance from center to mother*mother's mass. Note that the distances given in the problem are from the end and not the center.