Find the area of triangle BCD in the following figure

geometrytriangles

Triangles on same base

I have tried the following:

Since CD is median, area of Triangle BCD is half the area of triangle BCQ.Area of BCQ is 1/2*BQ*CD' where CD' is the altitude. Now we have to find CD'. This is where I am stuck.

How to find out the height of Traingle BCQ in this? Do we apply the concept of triangles on same base? Posted here only after trying my best.

Best Answer

As in the comments, the answer must be (a).

However, to prove this if the answers had not been given, drop a perpendicular, $CE$, of height $h$ from $C$ onto $BQ$ where $BE=x$.

By similar triangles, $\frac{10}{h}=\frac{100}{100-x}$ and $\frac{40}{h}=\frac{100}{x}$.

Then $x=20,h=8$ and so the required area is $\frac{1}{2}\times50\times h=200$.

N.B. A neat general result for this set up is that the reciprocal of $h$ is the sum of the reciprocals of the two given heights i.e.

$$\frac{1}{h}=\frac{1}{10}+\frac{1}{40}.$$

Proof

Let the given heights be $L,M$ and the base $D$. By similar triangles: $$\frac{L}{h}=\frac{D}{D-x}\text { and }\frac{M}{h}=\frac{D}{x}.$$ Then $$\frac{D-x}{hD}=\frac{1}{L}\text { and }\frac{x}{hD}=\frac{1}{M}.$$ Now add the two LH terms: $$\frac{D-x}{hD}\text +\frac{x}{hD}=\frac{D}{hD}=\frac{1}{h}$$ and so $$\frac{1}{h}=\frac{1}{L}+\frac{1}{M}.$$