The Craig Method

by Jorge Marin, Jr. September 2005 (Revised March 2013) The aim of this paper is demonstrate the relationship of line segments of variable lengths both along an unknown radius and perpendicular to the unknown radius of a given circle. In addition this paper will describe the systematic method of calculating the radius of a circle based upon this relationship. The line segment across the radius must be considered to be touching the circumference. Therefore, if given the length of a line and the height and that the

line radius

is along the radius , determine the length of the (figure 1).

The first observation is recognizing that the distance D to E and the distance from E to A add to equal the length of the radius of the circle,.

The next observation essential toward our aim is the recognition of the right triangle formed by points and, . . By knowing the lengths of line

segments hypotenuse

and

the length of the

can easily be calculated by

Pythagoreans theorem (figure3).

There is now enough information to calculate the angles, in degrees, of the triangle with points B, D, and E. The most important angles are angles .and formed

by sides

and

for

; and

and

for

(figure 4). The angles would of course be revealed by the use of Trigonometric functions .

or

or

Finding the degree angle of

and

will be necessary in completing the method.

When dealing with any isosceles triangle there will always exist two angles that are identical in degrees. There will also exist two line segments of equal lengths that join at the same vertex. This method will exploit these properties to produce the final answer (figure 5 and figure 6). Now having determined and , and recognizing that and is identical to the angel labeled

the angle between line segments

can be figured by simple subtraction. In this

paper that angle will be labeled

All components are now available to produce the relationship intended. Now observe the right triangle of figure 2. The angle of that triangle is known

and the length of the line segment

is known with this information the height of the line segment

can be calculated by multiplying the length

to the tangent of the angle

This is a simple mathematical computation that many high school students learn to determine the height of a building, however, it is most unlikely that they would use similar notation. Once the computation is completed you should be able to find the length of the line belonging to the radius between points between points and and and all there is left to do is add the remaining length of the line segment which was given as , thus completing your computation and resolving

the length of the radius :

The whole mathematical model, unabridged, would be the following: