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17 votes
17 votes
The path that a football takes can be described by the equation h=25t-5t^2, where h is the height of the football at time t, in seconds.After how many seconds will it be 20 meters high?

User Shandel
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1 Answer

22 votes
22 votes

1 - In order to solve this problem we have to solve the following equation

20 = 25t - 5t²

2 - In order to solve that equation we have to options

1 - Use the quadratic equation

2 - Factor the expression

For this probem we will facor the expression. The first thing that we will do is divide everything by 5, so we get

20/5 = ( 25/5 ) t - (5 / 5 ) t²

which would give us

4 = 5t - t²

Now we subtract 4 and we get

t² - 5t +4 = 0

then

t² - 5t +4 = (t - 4 ) (t - 1 ) = 0

Therefore there are two answers

t = 4

t = 1

Notice that the answer is correct because

h = 25(1) - 5*(1)² = 20

The path that a football takes can be described by the equation h=25t-5t^2, where-example-1
User Kelvin  Zhang
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