Question

You have boxes that will hold 1 cubic foot, 3 cubic feet,

9 cubic feet, and 27 cubic feet of paper. What is the fewest

number of boxes you need to hold 257 cubic feet of paper?

Answer 1

13 boxes

Explanation:

To calculate the minimum number of boxes that can be had with that amount of paper, they should be kept in the largest box, that is, the 27 cubic foot box, therefore, we divide:

257/27 = 9.51

Which means that we can save the paper in 9 boxes of 27 cubic feet, now we will save the rest in the next smaller box, the 9 cubic foot box.

First let's calculate how many leftover paper:

257 - 27 * 9 = 14

Therefore, we can only use 1 box of 9 cubic feet:

14 - 9 = 5

For the remaining 5 cubic feet use 1 box of 3 cubic feet and 2 boxes of 1 cubic foot.

Therefore, in total it would be:

9 of 27 ft ^ 3 + 1 of 9 ft ^ 3 + 1 of 3 ft ^ 3 + 2 of 1 ft ^ 3 = 13

a total of 13 boxes would be the minimum