Difference between revisions of "1998 AJHSME Problems/Problem 21"
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* [[AJHSME Problems and Solutions]] | * [[AJHSME Problems and Solutions]] | ||
* [[Mathematics competition resources]] | * [[Mathematics competition resources]] | ||
| + | {{MAA Notice}} | ||
Revision as of 23:32, 4 July 2013
Problem
A 
cubical box contains 64 identical small cubes that exactly fill the box. How many of these small cubes touch a side or the bottom of the box?
Solution
Solution 1
Each small cube would have dimensions 
making each cube a unit cube.
If there are 
cubes per face and there are 
faces we are counting, we have 
cubes.
Some cubes are on account of overlap between different faces.
We could reduce this number by subtracting the overlap areas, which could mean subtracting 4 cubes from each side and 12 from the bottom.
Solution 2
You can imagine removing the cubes that do not fit the description of the problem, forming a "square cup".
There are 
cubes in the center of the top face that do not fit the description. Remove those.
Once you remove those cubes on top, you must go down one level and remove the cubes in the same position on the second layer. Thus, more cubes are removed.
Finally, you repeat this on the third layer, for more cubes.
Once you do the top three layers, you will be on the bottom layer, and you don't remove any more cubes.
This means you removed 
cubes of the 
cubes.
Thus, 
cubes remain, and the answer is 
.
See also
| 1998 AJHSME (Problems • Answer Key • Resources) | ||
| Preceded by Problem 20 |
Followed by Problem 22 | |
| 1 • 2 • 3 • 4 • 5 • 6 • 7 • 8 • 9 • 10 • 11 • 12 • 13 • 14 • 15 • 16 • 17 • 18 • 19 • 20 • 21 • 22 • 23 • 24 • 25 | ||
| All AJHSME/AMC 8 Problems and Solutions | ||
The problems on this page are copyrighted by the Mathematical Association of America's American Mathematics Competitions. 
