a box with an open top is formed by cutting out of the corners of a rectangular piece of cardboard and then folding up the sides.

Question

if x represents the length of the side of the square cut from each corner and if the original piece of cardboard is 20 inches by 14 inches what size square must be cut if the volume of the box is to be 288 cubic inches?

Answer 1

You are cutting out four squares of dimension X. That means you remove X twice from the length and from the width. and the volume is going to be length x width x depth, where depth is X

 

(20 - 2X) * (14 - 2X) * X = 288

 

Solve for X