Homework Help: math

Posted by Eric on Friday, December 2, 2011 at 1:25pm.

A carpebter is making a brace in the shape of a right triangle. The hyp. is 41 inches long. The longer leg will be 31 inches longer than the shorter leg. Write a quadriatic equation that models the situation.

math - Steve, Friday, December 2, 2011 at 2:26pm
just plug in the numbers.

s^2 + (s+31)^2 = 41^2

to solve it, keep going:
s^2 + s^2 + 62s + 961 = 1681
2s^2 + 62s - 720 = 0
s^2 + 31s - 360 = 0
(s-9)(s+41) = 0
s = 9

the legs are 9 and 40

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