Determine Scalene Trapezoid with three sides and an angle adjacent to unknown side

geometryquadrilateraltrigonometry

Ran into this problem recently: I have a scalene trapezoid with parallel bases $b_1$ and $b_2$, and legs $l_1$ and $l_2$. Both base side lengths are known, but only one leg is known. In addition, one angle $\alpha$ is known, but that angle is adjacent to the unknown leg. Since the angles of a trapezoid leg are supplemental, the other angle adjacent to the unknown leg, $\beta$, is also known. The length of the midpoint $m$ can also be determined.

My question is, can the trapezoid be determined with this information? Specifically, I'm looking for the diagonals $d_1$ and $d_2$ as well as the unknown leg side length. Can the parallel bases be used to solve this in a simple(r) way?

Best Answer

Let the angle adjacent to the known leg be $\beta\in (0,\pi/2)$. Also let the angle $\alpha$ vary in the interval $(0,\pi)$. WLOG let the base adjacent to $\alpha,\beta$ have length $b_1$, and the known length be $l_1$ (adjacent to $\beta$). Dropping heights from the vertices on base $b_2$ to $b_1$ yields easily

$$h=l_1\sin\beta=l_2\sin\alpha\\ b_1=b_2+l_1\cos\beta+l_2\cos\alpha$$

Rearranging a bit we obtain

$$l_2=l_1\frac{\sin\beta}{\sin\alpha}\\ b_1-b_2=\frac{l_1}{\sin\alpha}\sin(\alpha+\beta)$$

For a given $\alpha,b_1, b_2, l_1$ we see that in principle we can express $\beta, l_2$ in terms of known quantities. By studying the behavior of the function $ f(x)=\sin(\alpha+x), x\in(0,\pi/2)$ we see that for any $\alpha\in (0,\pi)$ there is an interval in which $f$ is not one-to-one and hence the same set of known parameters can possibly parametrize two different trapezoids.

The casework here is a little tedious- I'll add details when I have more time.