ACT Math : Plane Geometry

Study concepts, example questions & explanations for ACT Math

varsity tutors app store varsity tutors android store varsity tutors ibooks store

Example Questions

Example Question #4 : How To Find The Area Of An Equilateral Triangle

What is the area of a triangle with a circle inscribed inside of it, in terms of the circle's radius R?

Circleinscribedintriangle

Possible Answers:

Correct answer:

Explanation:

Draw out 3 radii and 3 lines to the corners of each triangle, creating 6 30-60-90 triangles.  

See that these 30-60-90 triangles can be used to find side length. 

Formula for side of equilateral triangle is

.

Now substitute the new equation that is in terms of R in for S.

Example Question #5 : How To Find The Area Of An Equilateral Triangle

What is the area of a triangle inscribed in a circle, in terms of the radius R of the circle?

Triangleinscribedincircle2

Possible Answers:

Correct answer:

Explanation:

Draw 3 radii, and then 3 new lines that bisect the radii. You get six 30-60-90 triangles.  

These triangles can be used ot find a side length .  

Using the formula for the area of an equilateral triangle in terms of its side, we get

Example Question #2 : How To Find The Area Of An Equilateral Triangle

A circle contains 6 copies of a triangle; each joined to the others at the center of the circle, as well as joined to another triangle on the circle’s circumference.

The circumference of the circle is  

What is the area of one of the triangles?

Possible Answers:

Correct answer:

Explanation:

The radius of the circle is 2, from the equation circumference . Each triangle is the same, and is equilateral, with side length of 2. The area of a triangle 

 

To find the height of this triangle, we must divide it down the centerline, which will make two identical 30-60-90 triangles, each with a base of 1 and a hypotenuse of 2. Since these triangles are both right traingles (they have a 90 degree angle in them), we can use the Pythagorean Theorem to solve their height, which will be identical to the height of the equilateral triangle.

We know that the hypotenuse is 2 so . That's our  solution. We know that the base is 1, and if you square 1, you get 1.

Now our formula looks like this: , so we're getting close to finding .

Let's subtract 1 from each side of that equation, in order to make things a bit simpler: 

Now let's apply the square root to each side of the equation, in order to change  into 

Therefore, the height of our equilateral triangle is 

To find the area of our equilateral triangle, we simply have to multiply half the base by the height: 

The area of our triangle is 

Example Question #161 : Plane Geometry

The height of an equilateral triangle is . Find the perimeter. 

Possible Answers:

Correct answer:

Explanation:

From the given information, we can draw the following picture:

Equilateral

Since this is an equilateral triangle, all three of its angles will be congruent. All three of its sides will also be congruent.

The dotted line, representing the height, bisects not only the base of the triangle but also the apical angle. This means that the two smaller right triangles created by the dotted line have bases that are half the side length of the equilateral triangle with apical angle measures of

This creates two smaller 30/60/90 special right triangles. This problem can be solved in one of two ways:

1. You can use the derived side ratio for 30/60/90 triangles, , to solve for the length of one of the equilateral triangle's sides.

OR

2. You can use trig functions to solve for the length of one of the equilateral triangle's sides.

Using trig functions, we can use  as our angle of interest, with the length  and the hypotenuse being our mystery side.

Going back to SOH CAH TOA, we can determine that we will be using sine because we have the information available for the side opposite ("O") of our angle of interest and are looking for the hypotenuse ("H"). This means we will be using the "SOH" part of SOH CAH TOA—sine.

Substituting in the problem's values, we can solve for the length of the hypotenuse of one of the two smaller triangles, which is the length of one side of the equilateral triangle:

Remember that the problem asks for the triangle's perimeter. That means that we need to multiply the length of one of its edges by three to find the final answer:

Example Question #2 : How To Find The Length Of The Side Of An Equilateral Triangle

If an equilateral triangle has a height of  and an area of , what is the measure of one of its sides?

Possible Answers:

Correct answer:

Explanation:

For any triangle,  .

We know our height is  and our area is .

Therefore  so .

Example Question #1 : How To Find The Length Of The Side Of An Equilateral Triangle

An equilateral triangle has an area of  and a height of . What is the length of one of its sides?

Possible Answers:

Correct answer:

Explanation:

Since this triangle is equilateral, all of the sides (including the base) are equal.

Use the formula for area of a triangle to solve for the base:

In this case:

So the base is equal to 

Example Question #1 : How To Find The Length Of The Side Of An Equilateral Triangle

An equilateral triangle has a height of . What is the perimeter of this triangle?

Possible Answers:

Correct answer:

Explanation:

Since this is an equilateral triangle, all of the sides and all of the angles would be equal (60 degrees each since the 3 angles must add up to 180 degrees).

1. The height splits the triangle's base in half and creates two right triangles. Create expressions for the length of the two unknown sides in this new triangle:

The value we are looking for is the side length so we'll make that   

The base of the new triangle is half the length of a side so we'll make that    

 

2. Use the Pythagorean Theorem to find the value of  or the side length:

In this case:

 

3. Multiply the side length you found by 3 to get the perimeter:

 

Example Question #1 : How To Find An Angle In An Acute / Obtuse Triangle

Two interior angles in an obtuse triangle measure 123^{\circ} and 11^{\circ}. What is the measurement of the third angle. 

Possible Answers:

50^{\circ}

46^{\circ}

104^{\circ}

57^{\circ}

123^{\circ}

Correct answer:

46^{\circ}

Explanation:

Interior angles of a triangle always add up to 180 degrees. 

Example Question #1 : How To Find An Angle In An Acute / Obtuse Triangle

In a given triangle, the angles are in a ratio of 1:3:5.  What size is the middle angle?

Possible Answers:

45^{\circ}

60^{\circ}

20^{\circ}

75^{\circ}

90^{\circ}

Correct answer:

60^{\circ}

Explanation:

Since the sum of the angles of a triangle is 180^{\circ}, and given that the angles are in a ratio of 1:3:5, let the measure of the smallest angle be , then the following expression could be written:

x+3x+5x=180

9x=180

x=20

 

If the smallest angle is 20 degrees, then given that the middle angle is in ratio of 1:3, the middle angle would be 3 times as large, or 60 degrees.

Example Question #161 : Act Math

In the triangle below, AB=BC (figure is not to scale) .  If angle A is 41°, what is the measure of angle B?

                                       A (Angle A = 41°)

                                       Act_math_108_02               

                                     B                           C

 

Possible Answers:

41

90

82

98

Correct answer:

98

Explanation:

  If angle A is 41°, then angle C must also be 41°, since AB=BC.  So, the sum of these 2 angles is:

41° + 41° = 82°

Since the sum of the angles in a triangle is 180°, you can find out the measure of the remaining angle by subtracting 82 from 180:

180° - 82° = 98°

 

 

Learning Tools by Varsity Tutors