## hihi 4 years ago Find the volume of an equilateral triangular prism with triangles of side 4 cm and length 10 cm

1. hihi

i know it is area X height, but im not sure how to get the 2.

2. anonymous

it's actually V = (1/2)base*length*height

3. hihi

but how would you get the correct answer?

4. anonymous

is that really how the question is worded? exactly?

5. anonymous

oh wait.. sorry i get it now

6. hihi

oh

7. hihi

because i read and saw that to get the volume of a triangular prism it said area X height

8. anonymous

|dw:1328743809480:dw| seeing this you find the only thing you have to find is the height so.. chop the triangle in half ! |dw:1328743948170:dw|

9. hihi

so what would the height be?

10. anonymous

are you familiar with pythagorus theorem? excuse my spelling

11. hihi

yes im familiar but i just forget it

12. anonymous

well if i give you the equation : 2^2+h^2=4^2 will you be able to solve that in terms of h?

13. hihi

then would h be 2?

14. anonymous

no.. it's a little deeper than that first square the terms you know 2^2 =4 and 4^2 = 16 so.. 4+h^2=16

15. anonymous

or h^2=12

16. hihi

oh so h=6?

17. anonymous

not quite h^2 means h squared. and the only way to do that is to take the square root of both sides so. $\sqrt(h^2)=\sqrt12$ $h=\sqrt(12)$ now if you know how to do that on your calculator, that will be your value for h, or the height. then you can use that in the original equation i showed you to come up with your final answer!

18. hihi

TY SO MUCH :)