A gallon of latex paint can cover 500 square feet. Find how many gallon containers of paint should be.........

Question

A gallon of latex paint can cover 500 square feet. Find how many gallon containers of paint should be bought to paint two coats on each wall of a rectangular room whose dimensions are 14 feet by 16 feet (assume 8-foot ceiilings)

Answer 1

The key to this question is figuring out the square footage of the 4 walls.

There are two 14 ft. walls and two 16 ft. walls,
so this makes our calculations easier.

Area = Length x Width
Area of the two 14 ft. walls = 2 x 14 ft. x 8 ft.
Area of the two 14 ft. walls = 224 square feet.

Now, let's calculate the area of the 16 ft wide walls.
Area of the two 16 ft. walls = 2 x 16 ft. x 8 ft.
Area of the two 16 ft. walls = 256 square feet.

224 sq. feet + 256 sq. feet = 480 square feet.

480 sq. feet
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500 sq. feet per gal.

= .96 gallons for one coat.
So two coats would be 1.92 gallons.

Good luck in your studies,
~ Mitch ~

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BTW, Quatt47 gave an incorrect answer.
224 sq. ft. + 256 sq. ft. ≠ 580 square feet.
Remember, it's the little mistakes can cost you on a test.

Answer 2

I don't think you've been given the correct answer yet. The question asks how many gallon containers of paint you have to buy, so the answer is going to be some whole number of containers.

You have a rectangular room 14' x 16' with an 8' high ceiling.
So you have 2 walls that are 14' x 8' and 2 walls that are 16' x 8'

Sum up the areas of the 4 walls:
(2 * (14 * 8)) + (2 * (16 * 8)) = (2 * 112) + (2 * 128) = 224 + 256 = 480 square feet

You want to put two coats of paint, so you have to double the area:
2 * 480 = 960 square feet

So you'll need 2 gallons of paint
(2 * 500 square feet = 1000 square feet... the smallest whole number bigger than the area you need to paint.)

By the way, if you have to paint the ceiling also, you'll have to add 2*14*16 to the area to paint.
2 coats * ceiling area = 448 square feet
This would give you a total area to paint of 960 + 448 square feet = 1408 square feet
And, unfortunately, that would mean you'd have to buy a whole gallon of paint more, so you'd need to buy 3 gallons.

Answer 3

The way to do it is to calculate the area to be covered. You do not mention any doors or windows or whether the ceiling is to be painted. If just the walls then the calculation is:-

2 walls at 16 x 8 = 128 x 2 = 256 square feet
2 walls at 14 x 8 = 112 x 2 = 224 square feet
Total surface area = 580 square feet
2 coats required so total is
2 x 580 = 1160 square feet
1 gallon covers 500 square feet so gallons needed are
1160/500 = 2 160/500 or 2 8/25 gallons
Or in decimal 2.32 gallons

If there were doors and windows you would need to calculate the area of these and deduct it from the original wall area of 580 square feet then continue the calculation as shown.

Hope that helps.

Answer 4

1) First we need to find the area of the 4 walls that we will paint. This is actually the surface area of a rectangular cube/prism MINUS the top and bottom area. Area = 2(16 x 8) + 2( 14 x 8) A = 2(128) + 2(112) A = 256 + 224 A = 480 sq. feet Since you need to paint 2 coats, the total area is 960 sq. ft. You will need 960/500 = 1.92 gallons or 2 gallon containers of paint to paint the 4 walls.

Answer 5

Well to start with a gallon only covers 100 sq feet:)

Answer 6

7 gallons 1 qt.