Solving Trig Problem with Square Root: [0,2π) Interval | Forum Help Needed

  • Thread starter Thread starter Geekchick
  • Start date Start date
  • Tags Tags
    Trig
Join the discussion
Ask a follow-up here, or get your own question answered by working scientists, mathematicians and engineers — people, not an autocomplete.
Real named experts · corrections over time · the nuance an AI answer skips
Sign up Log in
4 replies · 3K views
Geekchick
Messages
77
Reaction score
0

Homework Statement



[tex]\sqrt{}3[/tex]sinx-3cosx=0 solve in interval [0,2[tex]\pi[/tex])

Homework Equations



reciprocal identities, pythagorean identities, confunction identities, Even/odd identities, sum/difference formulas, double angle formulas, power reducing formulas, half-angle formulas, sum to product formulas, product to sum formulas. I am not sure how many of those are relevant but that's all the identities and formulas I have learned so far.

The Attempt at a Solution



To be quite honest I don't even know where to start with this problem : ( mostly the square root of three is throwing me. I have been trying to solve this for days so if anyone could so much as tell me what formulas or identites to use i would appreciate it. I'm just so lost.

Oh also I'm new to this forum, just found it tonight, so i just want to say hi to everyone!
 
on Phys.org
Thank you! Thank you! thank you! I didn't even think about the fact that sin/cos is equal to tan duh! *smacks head* I was trying to make things way more complicated. So just to be sure once I divide by cos I'm left with the (square root of 3)tan=3 which after dividing that by the (square root of 3) and simplifying I have tan= square root of 3 which in the interval [0,2pi) means my answer is (pi/3) and (4pi/3). Yay!
 
Gib Z said:
In general, for things like a sin x +/- b cos x, we can combine them into a single sine term, using something known as the Auxiliary Angle method: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trigonometric_identity#Linear_combinations

EDIT: Damn, too late and a longer method. lol

The "auxiliary angle" method is fine -- it's just "overkill" on the equation

a sin x + b cos x = c

in the case where c = 0. When you follow through with it for this problem, you get

[tex]sin(x - \frac{4 \pi}{3}) = 0 \Rightarrow x - \frac{4 \pi}{3} = ..., -\pi, 0, \pi, ...[/tex]

with the results in the fundamental circle being the two Geekchick has found. (I'm just elaborating on this since it's always good to know multiple methods for solving a problem and to confirm that they all give the same answer.)