An engineer has a 54 inch wire that she has to cut into two pieces so that one piece is 8 inches shorter than the other find the length of each piece

Hey there!!

Let's take the length of the bigger piece as x inches

Then, the length of the smaller piece would be x - 8 inches

The sum of these lengths would be 54 inches

... x + x - 8 = 54

... 2x - 8 = 54

... Add 8 on both sides

... 2x = 62

... Divide 2 on both sides

... x = 31

Hence, the length of the bigger piece = 31 inches

The length of the smaller piece would be = 31 - 8 = 23 inches

Hope my answer helps!!

your answer would be 10x - 1