Answer:
The length of the shortest piece is .
The length of the medium-sized piece is .
The length of the longest piece is .
Step-by-step explanation:
The five-step method is GUESS method.
Given:
Length of copper wire,
Length of longest piece is 6 feet longer than the shortest one.
Length of the medium-sized piece is 3 times the shortest one.
Unknown:
Length of longest, medium-sized and shortest pieces of wire.
Let the length of shortest piece be feet.
Therefore, the length of longest piece is equal to .
And, length of the medium-sized piece is equal to .
Evaluate:
Sum of lengths of longest, medium-sized and shortest pieces of wire is equal to the total length of wire. So,
Substitute and Solve:
Now, we have, .
Substitute 1 for and solve for each sizes of wire pieces. This gives,
Length of shortest piece =
Length of medium-sized piece =
Length of longest piece =
Therefore, the lengths of shortest, medium-sized, and longest pieces are ,
and
respectively.