Is the geometry you learned in school useful away from school?

[old man emu]

What's the point of learning that? I'll never use it in real life. How often has that been heard in a whining voice from a reluctant student? Well today I learned a practical application using a property of an isosceles triangle. Which triangle is the isosceles triangle? It's the one that has two sides of equal length. I learned how to check that the angle in a corner of a box or frame is 90 degrees using two sticks of wood.

 

Here's the video I found that introduced me to the concept and showed me how to make a tool to apply the concept. I knocked the tool up in about half an hour, and have thrown it into my tool kit to use on Saturday when I am assembling the frame of a workbench I'm building at the Men's Shed.

 

 

 

[willedoo]

No good asking me, I averaged 20% for maths. Maybe I did geometry but don't remember it. I did tech drawing in grade 10, would that incorporate geometry?

[spacesailor]

You can also calculate the hight ( of a tree ) by the angle .

 

spacesailor

[nomadpete]

50 minutes ago, old man emu said:

Which triangle is the isosceles triangle? It's the one that has two sides of equal length.

That sounds like an equilateral triangle to me.

 

An easy way to check a square is to make a 3- 4- 5 triangle of scrap wood.

[old man emu]

20 minutes ago, willedoo said:

I did tech drawing in grade 10, would that incorporate geometry?

Of course it would. Technical drawing, or draughtsmanship is simply the use of basic geometric shapes and geometric rules to creating pictures of the object on wants to represent. Actually a lot of newer Computer-Aided Drawing software is based on basic three dimensional shapes that are morphed into the desired shape by "cutting" or merging boundaries.

[old man emu]

1 minute ago, nomadpete said:

That sounds like an equilateral triangle to me.

An equilateral triangle is a unique isosceles triangle in which the three sides are equal. All other isosceles triangles only have two sides equal. That is much the same as a square being a unique type of rectangle in which all sides are of equal length, or a circle being an ellipse in which the major and minor axes are equal in length.

[nomadpete]

I stand corrected.

 

And suitably chastened.

 

May I please sit down now?

[old man emu]

Just now, nomadpete said:

And suitably chastened.

 

No chastisement involved. I didn't know that until I looked it up to post a reply.

[nomadpete]

In answer to the question, yes. When I get it right, geometry helps.

Area of a circle, circumferences, etc. Also volume of concrete, area of flooring, coverage of paints. The list goes on. Used for making stuff.

[onetrack]

Yes, I did use geometry a lot when earthmoving. Used it to calculate cut to fill volumes, the amount of excavated dirt from a dam (the formula is the one for a truncated pyramid), calculate flood drainage levels and fall, volume of rainfall runoff for a given area, roadworks (slopes and grades).

I recently pulled out some of my high school books and came across a pad full of my technical drawings and was surprised to see how good they were, and how comprehensive. Plans, elevations and perspective views, I did the lot!

But I never did use it again after I left school, mores the pity. I need to drag out all that old schoolwork and books, now that I'm in the process of building a shed! 

[Marty_d]

I have a cert 4 in Residential Drafting and never used it in anger.

Comes in handy for planning renovations though.

[facthunter]

I taught a subject called "Descriptive Geometry and Workshop Drawings" which has Myriad applications. ie Deriving Involute curves ,(Gear Teeth) Archimedean spirals Reflective Mirrors, Parabola's  Blueprints for Making EVERYTHING Profiling intersecting solids,(Shapes) Various Projections, Isometric Axonometric Plan and elevations. for houses .Machine drawing Protocol.. From Architects to Engineers and space  orbital projections . Mapping, Navigation On and ON.  Nothing gets made without it. At the Higher end it gets very Mathematical and Complex. . Nev

[pmccarthy]

My first job on the mines was surveyor's assistant which involved a lot of drawing but in the first week I did nothing but colouring in with pencils. It was the peak of my career.

[Jerry_Atrick]

Geometry + trigonometry = games programming..

 

Many billionaires made from it.

[facthunter]

You are there to stop the HOLES intersecting OR makes sure they do and have to work in 3 dimensions like when flying.. Kids do colouring in at Kinder.  Nev

[Jerry_Atrick]

As long as the holes of the swiss cheese don't aligh, I am happy...

 

 

[facthunter]

Stiff Cheddar when they do. Nev