SOLUTION: The shorter leg of a right triangle is 7 foot shorter than the longer leg. The hypotenuse is 7 foot longer than the longer leg. Find the side lengths of the triangle.

Question 1006899: The shorter leg of a right triangle is 7 foot shorter than the longer leg. The hypotenuse is 7 foot longer than the longer leg. Find the side lengths of the triangle.

Answer by vleith(2983) (Show Source): You can put this solution on YOUR website!
The legs are x (x+7) and (x+14)
Since it is a right triangle, you know Pythagorean applies

Solved by pluggable solver: SOLVE quadratic equation with variable

Quadratic equation (in our case ) has the following solutons:

For these solutions to exist, the discriminant should not be a negative number.

First, we need to compute the discriminant : .

Discriminant d=784 is greater than zero. That means that there are two solutions: .

Quadratic expression can be factored:

Again, the answer is: 21, -7. Here's your graph:

Since the length cannot be negative, then x = 21.
Sides are 21, 28, and 35 feet
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