1985 AIME Problems/Problem 2
Problem
When a right triangle is rotated about one leg, the volume of the cone produced is . When the triangle is rotated about the other leg, the volume of the cone produced is
. What is the length (in cm) of the hypotenuse of the triangle?
Solution
Let one leg of the triangle have length and let the other leg have length
. When we rotate around the leg of length
, the result is a cone of height
and radius
, and so of volume
. Likewise, when we rotate around the leg of length
we get a cone of height
and radius
and so of volume
. If we divide this equation by the previous one, we get
, so
. Then
so
and
so
. Then by the Pythagorean Theorem, the hypotenuse has length
.