A square and a equilateral triangle are to be formed out of the same piece of wire. The wire is 6 inches long. How do you maximize the total area the square and the triangle contain?

Brooke Richard

Brooke Richard

Answered question

2022-11-09

A square and a equilateral triangle are to be formed out of the same piece of wire. The wire is 6 inches long. How do you maximize the total area the square and the triangle contain?

Answer & Explanation

ustalovatfog

ustalovatfog

Beginner2022-11-10Added 11 answers

Let be L=s+t the total length as the addition of s the length used by the square and t the length used by the triangle.
The square area is a s = ( s 4 ) 2 and the equilateral triangle area is given by
a t = ( t 6 ) ( t 3 ) 2 - ( t 6 ) 2 = t 2 12 3
the total area is then a = a s + a t = s 2 16 + t 2 12 3
but t = L - s then a = ( L - s ) 2 12 3 + s 2 16
The area critical point is determined doing d a d s = 0 and obtaining s = 4 3 L 9 + 4 3
and also t = 9 L 9 + 4 3

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