hi draketcg
Welcome to the forum!
If you call the length x then the width must be (24 - 2x)/2 = 12 - x
So the area is x(12-x)
So the question is, can you make that equal to 40 ?
If you try to solve that using the quadratic formula:
There are no real values of x to solve that square root so it would seem it is not possible.
To find the biggest area I'll make a graph first :
You can see from the graph ( at the end ) that the maximum is below 40, so that confirms the statement above.
Quadratics are symmetrical so the maximum will be at x = 6
Or use calculus to find the maximum.
So biggest area = 6(12-6) = 36
Bob