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The mkiv Supra Owners Club

Maths is sooo easy!


Jake

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Ah how lovely and pure. A perfect right angled 3,4,5 triangle.

 

 

The 3-4-5 triangle is very useful in calculations of distance. If the data can be adapted to fit a 3-4-5 configuration, no tables or calculation of square root (Pythagorean Theorem) are needed.

 

EXAMPLE: An observer at the top of a 40-foot vertical tower knows that the base of the tower is 30 feet from a target on the ground. How does he calculate his slant range (direct line of sight) from the target?

 

SOLUTION: The desired length, AB, is the hypotenuse of a right triangle whose shorter sides are 30 feet and 40 feet long. Since these sides are in the ratio 3 to 4 and angle C is 90°) the triangle is a 3-4-5 triangle. Therefore, side AB represents the 5-unit side of the triangle. The ratio 30 to 40 to 50 is equivalent to 3-4-5, and thus side AB is 50 units long.

 

 

If you ever need to draw a perfect 3,4,5 triangle do it like this:

image

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Maths rocks!

 

The most fun I had with maths was programming a 3D ray tracing rendering system which plotted light rays on a hexagonal wireframe model to give it a cylindrical appearance. The light varied in intensity depending on where you position the light source.

It was part of my Computer Science degree.

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