You have the following 8 triangles:
If you connect them at their edges to form a solid, such that the two equilateral triangles don't share an edge, what is the volume of the resulting solid?
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I created a different solid with the same configuration of sides.
intriguing Solid
Is this the same as Marta's?
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Actually this is the same solid... It may not have been clear from my picture, but it only shows one of the tetrahedra cut off... When you cut the second one off the opposite corner you get your solid pictured here!
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I was misled by orientating the solid so that one of the equilateral triangles was the base.
Result is a triangular anti-prism with bases side a = 2 . Regular triangular anti-prism is an octahedron with volume (for edge a = 2 )
V
=
3
2
a
3
=
3
4
In top view
A
C
=
2
1
,
∠
A
C
B
=
9
0
∘
,
∠
C
A
B
=
3
0
∘
therefore
A
B
=
3
2
With side edge a = 2 the height would be h 2 = 2 − A B 2 = 2 − 3 2 = 3 2
With side edge a = 1 the height is instead h 1 = 1 − A B 2 = 1 − 3 2 = 3 1
So we need to take the volume of a regular tetrahedron and multiply it by the ration of the heights.
V = 3 4 × h 2 h 1 = 3 4 × 2 1 = 3 2
@Marta Reece Interesting approach... But I think that is the volume for a regular octahedron... This octahedran isn't quite regular since its faces aren't all equilateral triangles.
In fact, its volume is exactly half the area of a regular octahedron.
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Still working on it. It didn't want to give me preview without posting first. Sorry.
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Ah ok, got it... Figured it might be something like that... (Since you got the answer correct! :0) )
The isosceles triangles are 45-90-45 with unit sides.
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The resulting solid is a unit cube with two tetrahedral corners cut off. Here is an image of one of them:
Since the areas of those tetrahedral corners are each 6 1 then the volume of the resulting cube will be given by:
V = 1 − 6 1 − 6 1 = 3 2