What is the ratio of the surface area of a cube to the

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What is the ratio of the surface area of a cube to the [#permalink]

12 Aug 2007, 05:18

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What is the ratio of the surface area of a cube to the surface area of a rectangular solid identical to the cube in all ways except that its length has been doubled?

A. 1/4

B. 3/8

C. 1/2

D. 3/5

E. 2

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Re: PS : Ratio of surface areas [#permalink]

12 Aug 2007, 05:30

trahul4 wrote:

This one should be D.

Surface area cube1 = 6*a^2
Surface area cube2 = 2*(a^2 + 2a*a + 2a*a) = 10*a^2
So, ratio is 3/5.

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Re: PS : Ratio of surface areas [#permalink]

12 Aug 2007, 06:11

trahul4 wrote:

sumande wrote:

Surface area cube2 = 2*(a^2 + 2a*a + 2a*a) = 10*a^2
.

can you tell me how you arrived at this ?

If each side of the original cube is a, then for the new cube the sides will be 2a, a, a.
Four faces of the new cube will have an area 2a*a and the remaining two faces have area a*a.
Surface area of a cuboid (rectangular solid) = 2(lb + lh + bh), where l,b,h are respectively the length, breadth and height of the solid.

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12 Aug 2007, 06:15

the rectangular solid has 6 sides - 2 of which are squares, 4 of which are rectangles. you can pick numbers to illustrate:

cube with sides of length 4: area = (4*4)(6) = 96

rectangular solid with dimensions 8 x 4 x 4 (the only dimension that changes is the length, which is doubled) still has six sides, but this time only 2 of them are still squares, the other 4 are rectangles:

(4*4)(2 sides) = 32
(8*4)(4 sides) = 128
total surface area of rectangular solid = 160

96/160 = 3/5

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Re: PS : Ratio of surface areas [#permalink]

12 Aug 2007, 08:39

trahul4 wrote:

l = length, w = width, h = height
surface area = 2 (lw + wh + lh)

I just plugged in values to calculate what the ratio would be:

SA of square: l=w=h = 2
2 (2*2 + 2*2 + 2*2) = 24

SA of rectangle: l = 4, w=h = 2
2 (4*2 + 2*2 + 4*2) = 40

24/40 = 3/5 (D)

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12 Aug 2007, 10:23

IMO D

Original Surface Area = 6a^2
New Surface Area = 10a^2

ratio - 3:5

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13 Aug 2007, 10:04

OA is ofcourse 3/5. Was easy eh ?

[#permalink] 13 Aug 2007, 10:04

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What is the ratio of the surface area of a cube to the

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