SOLUTION: The hypotenuse of a right triangle is three times the length of one of the legs. The length of the other leg is 288⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯√ feet. Find the lengths of the leg and hypot

Click here to see ALL problems on Pythagorean-theorem

Question 1188478: The hypotenuse of a right triangle is three times the length of one of the legs. The length of the other leg is 288⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯√ feet. Find the lengths of the leg and hypotenuse.
Found 2 solutions by ikleyn, Solver92311:
Answer by ikleyn(52781) (Show Source):
You can put this solution on YOUR website!
.

x^2 + 288 = (3x)^2 and so on . . .

In reality, I don't know how to interpret your " 288⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯√ feet " .

Answer by Solver92311(821) (Show Source):
You can put this solution on YOUR website!

I presume you meant when you wrote 288-------√.

The appropriate plain text notation for the square root of an argument is sqrt{argument}. So you would have been more understandable if you had written sqrt{288}. Please use standard plain text notation in the future so that we don't have to guess what you mean.

The measures of the three sides of a right triangle are related by the Pythagorean Theorem thus:

where is the measure of the hypotenuse and and are the measures of the other two legs.

You are given the relationship between the hypotenuse and one of the legs. We can call the leg side because the labels on the legs are arbitrary.

So given that the measure of leg a is , the measure of the hypotenuse is .

Rearranging Pythagoras' formula, we get:

Since we are given , then

Furthermore, since we know that , we can say:

Solve for and then calculate

John

My calculator said it, I believe it, that settles it

From
I > Ø