Friday, 13 March 2015

algebra precalculus - Find the fraction that creates a repeating decimal that repeats certain digits



Is there any way to find the fraction x/y that, when converted to a decimal, repeats a series of digits z? For example: x/y=z.zzzzzzzz... or with actual numbers, x/y=234.234234234... (z is 234)



If this is impossible, is there a way that does the same but the value to the left of the decimal is not z?


Answer




There's a nice fact (derived from the expression demonstrated by TonyK): The repeating decimal 0.zzz can be represented by
z10l(z)1
where l(z) here denotes the number of digits of z.



Now if we want instead z.zzz, all we have to do is multiply the above expression by 10l(z) (or as Joffan points out - simply add z), getting
10l(z)z10l(z)1


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