Question

A microwave oven has a capacity of 1.75 ft³. The interior of the microwave is 18in wide and 14in deep. What is the height of the interior of the microwave, to the nearest tenth of a foot?

Answer 1

Explanation:

This is a volume problem as indicated by the exponent on the unit feet. Cubed is a volume thing, whereas squared is an area thing, etc.

The volume for a box-shaped microwave is

V = l x w x h and we are given the length and the width, but those are in inches and they need to be in feet. That's the tricky part here...catching the inconsistency in the units!

18 inches = 1.5 ft and

14 inches = 7/6 feet

Filling in:

1.75 = 1.5 x 7/6 x h and

1.75 = 1.75h so

h = 1 foot