this is trig
the wire is fastened 40 feet BELOW the top ... how high up?
the wire is the hypotenuse of a right triangle
... you know the length of one side (height of attachment point)
... you know the angle with the ground
draw a sketch
A smokestack is 150
feet high. A guy wire must be fastened to the stack
40
feet from the top. The guy wire makes an angle of 40∘
with the ground. Find the length of the guy wire rounded to the nearest foot.
- I've got no idea where to start or what to do. I understand that it is 150 high, but do we add on the other 40 to that? It seems that there are two equations going on, overall I am just very confused. Please and thank you for any help.
2 answers
Read carefully, the wire is attached 40 ft from the top, so the wire is attached 110 ft above the ground.
So now it becomes very simple, a right-angled triangle with base angle of 40°, and an opposite side of 110 ft.
We want the hypotenuse h, so
sin40° = 110/h
solve for h, see how easy it becomes ?
(let me know what you get)
So now it becomes very simple, a right-angled triangle with base angle of 40°, and an opposite side of 110 ft.
We want the hypotenuse h, so
sin40° = 110/h
solve for h, see how easy it becomes ?
(let me know what you get)
1 answer