Question

A rectangular box has faces with areas of 12,15, and 20 square units. What is the volume of the box?

Answer 1

First find the side lengths of the box by factoring each area:

12: 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 12
15: 1, 3, 5, 15
20: 1, 2, 4, 5, 10, 20

Find 3 numbers that both have 2 sides have in common and can multiply to make the areas of the faces:

12: 3 * 4
15: 3 * 5
20: 4 * 5

Sides: 3, 4, and 5

Then multiply to get the volume:

3 * 4 * 5 = 60 units^2