Question

A safety regulation requires the height of a guardrail to be 42 inches with an absolute deviation (the difference it can vary) of 3 inches. Find the minimum and maximum heights of a guardrail.

Answer 1

The deviation, means from the shortest height to the tallest height can have a difference of 3 inches.

Using 42 as a midpoint, you would subtract half the deviation to find the shortest value and add half the deviation to find the tallest value:

3/2 = 1.5

42 - 1.5 = 40.5

42 + 1.5 = 43.5

Minimum = 40.5 inches.

Maximum = 43.5 inches.