Objective
Measure the dimensions (size in different directions such as height, length, and width) of different juice box products to find out which manufacturer has the largest volume of juice and uses the least amount of packaging material.
Materials Required
Method
Surface Area of a Prism = 2(lh + wh + lw) Volume of a Prism = lwh
Where, l = length of the prism
w = width of the prism and, h = height of the prism
Measure the dimensions (size in different directions such as height, length, and width) of different juice box products to find out which manufacturer has the largest volume of juice and uses the least amount of packaging material.
Materials Required
- Metric ruler
- Juice boxes, five or more different brands (one per brand)
- Notebook.
Method
- In this experiment, you will be measuring the sides of several juice boxes to calculate the amount of packaging that each juice box is made of (surface area) and how much juice it holds (volume). Make a data table, in your lab notebook to keep track of your measurements and other data.
- Take the first juice box and write in your data table:
- The brand name of the juice box.
- The volume of juice (in fluid ounces) that the manufacturer put in the box. This information is usually found on the front of the juice box near the bottom.
- Using a metric ruler, measure the length, width, and height of the juice box in centimeters, and write the measurements into the data table. Figure 1 in the Introduction shows you where to make each of these measurements.
- Type in your values for
length, width, and height into the boxes, choose your units (this should be
centimeters).
- Calculate the surface area and volume of each juice box using
the following formulas:
Surface Area of a Prism = 2(lh + wh + lw) Volume of a Prism = lwh
Where, l = length of the prism
w = width of the prism and, h = height of the prism
- Now analyze your data and conclude which company uses the least
amount of packaging and gives you the largest volume of juice.