OCR C4 — Question 7

Exam BoardOCR
ModuleC4 (Core Mathematics 4)
TopicVectors 3D & Lines

7. Relative to a fixed origin, two lines have the equations
and $$\begin{aligned} & \mathbf { r } = \left( \begin{array} { c } 7
0
- 3 \end{array} \right) + s \left( \begin{array} { c } 5
4
- 2 \end{array} \right)
& \mathbf { r } = \left( \begin{array} { l } a
6
3 \end{array} \right) + t \left( \begin{array} { c } - 5
14
2 \end{array} \right) , \end{aligned}$$ where \(a\) is a constant and \(s\) and \(t\) are scalar parameters.
Given that the two lines intersect,
  1. find the position vector of their point of intersection,
  2. find the value of \(a\). Given also that \(\theta\) is the acute angle between the lines,
  3. find the value of \(\cos \theta\) in the form \(k \sqrt { 5 }\) where \(k\) is rational.