HNC Building Services Engineering

AM1S40 Engineering Mathematics 1

Session 2
Fractions and Percentages
 Today’s content

• Recap last week

• Look at any issues from first part of Tutorial sheet
• Rounding
• Scientific and Engineering notation
• Fractions
• Percentages
 Last Week’s Session
• Module structure
• Numbers
• Symbols
• Addition, subtraction, multiplication and division
• Reciprocals
• Powers
• Factorials
• BODMAS
• Rounding, DP and SF
• Scientific and engineering notation
 Numbers and symbols

-10 -9 -8 -7 -6 -5 -4 -3 -2 -1 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Negative numbers Positive numbers

-3 > -7
𝑥≥8
 Rules for Addition, Subtraction,
Multiplication and Division

• The order is important with subtraction and

division.
• Handling negative numbers
 Reciprocals
• 1 over the number, or turn a fraction upside
down
1
Reciprocal of 6 is
6

3 4
Reciprocal of is
4 3
 Powers aka Indices
• On the recommended calculators you will
have a 𝑥 █ button

• 45 = 4 x 4 x 4 x 4 x 4 = 1024

• 102 = 100 103 = 1,000 104 = 10,000

 Powers of 1 and 0
• A number to power 1 is itself
• 31 = 3
• Any number to power zero is 1
• 30 = 1
 Negative Powers
• The reciprocal of the number raised to the
positive power
1 1
• 2−3 = =
23 8
• Powers of 10 are particularly useful
1 1
• -1
10 = = = 0.1
101 10
1 1
• 10-2 = = = 0.01
102 100
1 1
• 10-3 = = = 0.001
103 1000
 Fractional Powers
1
𝑛
• 𝑥 =
𝑛 𝑥
1
• 4 = 4=2
2
1
3
• 27 = 3 27 = 3

3 ∎
• Calculator: ∎ ∎ □
 Combined powers
𝑚
− 1
•𝑥 𝑛 = 𝑛
𝑥𝑚

2
−3 1 1 1
•9 = 3 = 3 = = 0.231
92 81 4.327
to 2D
∎
• Try it on your calculator using 𝑥
Multiplication of Powered Numbers
• If a number raised to a power is multiplied by
the same number raised to a power, we can
add the powers
• 32 x 33 = 35 = 3 x 3 x 3 x 3 x3 = 243

• We will use this a lot with powers of 10

• 105 x 103 = 108
• 10-3 x 109 = 106
 Factorials

• E.g. five factorial

• 5! = 5 x 4 x 3 x 2 x 1 = 120
 BODMAS
• (Or BIDMAS) defines the order in which
operations are performed
• Brackets 1st priority
• Operators (e.g. Powers) 2nd priority
• Division
• Multiplication 3rd priority
• Addition
• Subtraction 4th priority
 Rounding
• We can shorten numbers by rounding them
off.
• If the next digit is 4 or less round down
• If the next digit is 5 or more, round up

• 6.12 would be rounded to 6.1 (rounded down)

• But 6.18 would round to 6.2 (rounded up)
• And 6.15 would also round to 6.2
 Decimal Places
• We can round off a long number by quoting it
correct to a specified number of places after
the decimal point
• Π = 3.141592654….
• Π = 3.1 to 1 DP
• Π = 3.14 to 2 DP
• Π = 3.142 to 3 DP (rounded up because the next digit is 5)
• Π = 3.1416 to 4 DP (rounded up because the next digit is 9)
 Significant Figures
• For whole numbers that end in zeroes, the
final zeroes are assumed not to be significant
unless specified
• 8248 to 2S is 8200
• For numbers less than one (N < 1) we start
counting from the first non-zero digit on the
left
• 0.00382195 to 6S
• 0.00382 to 3S
 Scientific and Engineering
Notation
Number Scientific Engineering

5000 5 x 103 5 x 103

38,462 3.8462 x 104 38.462 x 103

= 3.85 x 104 to 3 SF = 38.5 x 103 to 3 SF

0.0006549 6.549 x 10-4 654.9 x 10-6

= 6.55 x 10-4 to 3 SF = 655 x 10-6 to 3 SF
 Practice

• Any problems with the exercise sheets from

last week?
Break
 Fractions

𝑥 𝑛𝑢𝑚𝑒𝑟𝑎𝑡𝑜𝑟
𝑦 𝑑𝑒𝑛𝑜𝑚𝑖𝑛𝑎𝑡𝑜𝑟

1 27
𝑜𝑓 27 = =9
3 3
 Equivalent Fractions

1 2 3 150
= = =
2 4 6 300

Simplifying a fraction is bringing it down to the

150 1
smallest possible numbers, so simplifies to
300 2
 Proper and Improper
• Proper fractions: numerator < denominator
2 1
• e.g. 6
3 4
• Improper fractions: numerator > denominator
22
• e.g.
7
 Multiplying and Dividing
𝑎 𝑐 𝑎×𝑐
× =
𝑏 𝑑 𝑏×𝑑

• Dividing by a fraction is the same as

multiplying by its reciprocal
𝑎 𝑐 𝑎 𝑑 𝑎×𝑑
÷ = × =
𝑏 𝑑 𝑏 𝑐 𝑏×𝑐
 Adding Fractions
• Easy if the denominators are the same
𝑎 𝑏 𝑎+𝑏
+ =
𝑐 𝑐 𝑐
7 5 12 1
+ = which simplifies to
24 24 24 2

• Otherwise, need to convert one or both of the

fractions to their equivalents so that both do
have the same denominator
• To do this we find the lowest common
denominator
 Adding Fractions
• Lowest Common denominator

7 5
+ =?
8 6

• Smallest number into which 8 and 6 both

divide with no remainder is 24
7 5 21 20 21 + 20 41 17
+ = + = = =1
8 6 24 24 24 24 24
 Subtracting Fractions
• Same processes as with addition, depending
on whether denominators are the same or not

7 5 21 20 21 − 20 1
− = − = =
8 6 24 24 24 24
 Percentages
• A ratio expressed so that the denominator is
100
1 20
= = 20%
5 100
To convert a fraction or decimal to a percentage,
multiply by 100
4 4 400
= × 100% = % = 80%
5 5 5

0.78 = 0.78 x 100% = 78%

 Percentages
• A ratio expressed so that the denominator is 100
1 20
= = 20%
5 100
And to convert a percentage to a fraction or
decimal to a percentage, divide by 100

78% = 78 ÷ 100 = 0.78

Or
78 39
78% = =
100 50
 Percentage of a number
• Example:
30
30% of 70 is × 70 = 21
100
Percentage increase / decrease
• Example
• Result 1 = 58
• Result 2 = 73
• What is the percentage increase ?
Increase = 73-58 = 15
Percentage increase
𝐼𝑛𝑐𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑠𝑒 15
= × 100 = × 100 = 25.9% (1D)
𝐼𝑛𝑖𝑡𝑖𝑎𝑙 𝑣𝑎𝑙𝑢𝑒 58
 Review
• Scientific and Engineering notation
• Fractions
• Percentages
 Next week

• Introduction to Algebra