GY1004: EARTH A DYNAMIC PLANET B

REFRESHER

BASIC NUMERACY: A

HELP SHEET 1 BASIC TRIGONOMETRY

1.1 Trigonometry.
1.1.1 Introduction. Geographers often use calculations involving right-angle
triangles in, for example, calculating the height of a tree or cliff using a
clinometer. The study of triangles is called trigonometry.
There are two types of problems involving right-angle triangles that you will
come across:
1) those where you know the length of two sides and just want to find the length
of the remaining side without needing the angles for this you can use
Pythagoras theorem;
2) those where you either know angles and need to find side lengths, OR you
know side lengths and need to find angles for this you need to use the
trigonometric ratios, sine, cosine or tangent.
N.B. For calculations involving triangles that do not have a right-angle you will
need to use different equations that are a bit more complicated: we wont
consider these.
1.1.2 Internal angles of a triangle. An important rule for all triangles worth
remembering is that the internal angles of a triangle always add up to
180. Since a right-angle is 90, this means that the other two angles inside a
right angle triangle must add up to 90 as well. Therefore if you know one of the
angles (lets call it ; the Greek letter alpha) you can quickly calculate the other
(lets call it ; the Greek letter beta), because + = 90 and rearranging this
gives us = 90- . If you are not familiar with the commonly used symbols from
the Greek alphabet, see Help Sheet 2.
1.1.3 The hypotenuse. The longest side, known as the hypotenuse, is always
the other side of the triangle from the right angle. You can think of it as the right
angle symbol always pointing across the triangle to the hypotenuse.

hypotenuse

right angle

1.2 Calculating the length of a side using Pythagoras theorem. If the

length of two sides of a right angled triangle are known, the length of the third
side can be calculated using Pythagoras theorem even if you dont know any of
the angles (though it must be a right-angled triangle).

Pythagoras states that the square of the hypotenuse (H 2) is equal to the sum of
the squares of the other two sides the opposite and adjacent (O 2 + A2), or in an
equation:
H2 = O2 +A2
If you know two of the sides, then you can substitute the known values into the
equation and solve to find the unknown.
In any trigonometric calculations, it is useful to study the problem and then draw
a quick sketch of the triangle, drawing angles that you know approximately
correctly and side lengths approximately to scale. Annotate all the information
that you know already onto your sketch, making sure to mark the right angle and
the hypotenuse.
For example:
52 = 2 2 + ? 2

hypotenuse
?m

5m
2m

Next, rearrange the equation to find the unknown. First get it by itself (unless you
are trying to find the hypotenuse, in which case you are already there).
Remembering the rules for rearranging equations (see Help Sheet 2 if you are
unfamiliar with these):
Subtract 22 from each side
+ ?2

52 2 2 = 2 2 2 2

Cancel 22 on RHS

52- 22 = ?2

Evaluate the known squares

25 4 = ?2

Evaluate subtraction

21 = ?2

Finally take the square root on both sides to find your unknown
The answer

21 = ?2

4.583 m

1.3 Calculating (i) the length of a sides knowing angles and (ii)
calculating angles knowing the length of sides. Commonly, we know just
the length of one side and one angle, and we want to find the length of one of
the other sides, or we have the length of two sides and want to find the angle.
For these problems, we use trigonometric ratios.
The trigonometric ratios are
sin (angle) = opposite/hypotenuse
cos (angle) = adjacent/hypotenuse

sin (angle) = O/H

cos (angle) = A/H

tan (angle) = opposite/adjacent

tan (angle) = O/A

and are only applicable to right angle triangles.

These ratios can be
remembered by representing them as strings of letters, as in SOH-CAH-TOA. The
memorization of this mnemonic can be aided by expanding it into a phrase, such
as Some Officers Have Curly Auburn Hair Till Old Age (or replace with your own
phrase constructed of words beginning with the letters S-O-H-C-A-H-T-O-A)!
Clearly, in using these rules it is important to identify the opposite and adjacent
sides of the triangle. This is where it is easy to get confused because which side
is opposite and which side is adjacent depends on which angle you are
examining! Tip pretend you are standing inside the angle in question and
looking out from it. The opposite face will be across from you, the adjacent side
will be to your side.

hypotenuse

hypotenuse

adjacent

opposite

opposite

adjacent

Decide which of the trigonometric ratios to use you need to use the one that
has two known values along with the unknown value that you are trying to find.
Consider:

45

hypotenuse

3m

? m

Here, the known length (3 m) is adjacent to the angle 45, and we want to find
the length of the hypotenuse, therefore we use cosine
Substitute your values into the cosine equation and rearrange to find the
unknown:
cos 45 = 3/H
Multiply both sides by H

Hcos45 =

Cancel H which is top and bottom of RHS

Divide by cos 45 (note moves as a single term)

3H
H

Hcos45 = 3

Hcos 45
3
=
cos 45
cos 45

H=

Cancel cos 45 which is top and bottom on LHS

3
cos 45

Evaluate your equation. In our example that means using your calculator to find
the cosine of 45 and dividing 3 by that value = 4.243 m. IMPORTANT: Before
your start doing anything with sine, cosine or tangent check that your calculator
is using degrees to calculate angles - your calculator should show DEG
somewhere on the screen. The alternative is another measure of angle called
radians that will cause problems if your calculator thinks you are giving it angles
in radians rather than degrees.
Note that in the situation where you have two lengths and are trying to find the
angle you will not need to rearrange the equation, but you need to use the
inverse sin (=sin-1), cos (=cos-1) or tan (=tan-1) button on your calculator to find
the angle from the ratio of the two sides. For example:
cos = A/H
cos = 3/4.243 = 0.7071
= cos-1 0.7071 = 45

?
3m

hypotenuse
4.243 m

The inverse trigonometric functions (cos -1, sin-1 and tan-1) produce the angle
corresponding to a particular value for a cosine, sine or tangent. For example,
sin(37 ) = 0.602 and therefore sin-1(0.602) = 37 . Be careful: although
standard, this notation is poor since the square of a sin (or tan or cos) is written
sin2 (e.g. the square of sin(45) is sin2(45). Thus sin-1(45) might be thought
erroneously to be 1/sin(45). It is not.