• Want to help us with this year's BoS Trials?
    Let us know before 30 June. See this thread for details
  • Looking for HSC notes and resources?
    Check out our Notes & Resources page

Parametric Form in Conics (1 Viewer)

beanbean

New Member
Joined
Dec 1, 2014
Messages
2
Gender
Female
HSC
2015
Hi there friends,
I've been doing this question:
P is a point on the ellipse with equation x^2/a^2 +y^2/b^2 = 1 with focus at S.
The normal at P intersects the X-axis at Q. Show that QS=ePS.

I let my co-ordinates by (x1, y1), found the point Q and distance of PS.
I then tried to prove QS = ePS using LHS & RHS.
LHS went fine, but RHS I could not figure out!!
Looking at the solutions our teacher did, he used (acos(theta), bsin(theta)) and he proved QS = ePS
Are we meant to always use parametric form for questions where no actual numerical values are provided??
Please help! Any help is appreciated tbh!!
Thanks for even looking :)
 

braintic

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jan 20, 2011
Messages
2,137
Gender
Undisclosed
HSC
N/A
Hi there friends,
I've been doing this question:
P is a point on the ellipse with equation x^2/a^2 +y^2/b^2 = 1 with focus at S.
The normal at P intersects the X-axis at Q. Show that QS=ePS.

I let my co-ordinates by (x1, y1), found the point Q and distance of PS.
I then tried to prove QS = ePS using LHS & RHS.
LHS went fine, but RHS I could not figure out!!
Looking at the solutions our teacher did, he used (acos(theta), bsin(theta)) and he proved QS = ePS
Are we meant to always use parametric form for questions where no actual numerical values are provided??
Please help! Any help is appreciated tbh!!
Thanks for even looking :)
Either method is fine. See my solution for Cartesian coords:

View attachment Soln.pdf
 
Last edited:

Users Who Are Viewing This Thread (Users: 0, Guests: 1)

Top