Convert Cubic Feet to Gallons
Knowing the formula for converting cubic feet to gallons can be useful, whether you're adding a small water feature to your yard or calculating the water bill for a new above-ground swimming pool. All it takes is an understanding of some simple rules and procedures.
Instructions
1. Learn the basic formula for a cube: Cubic footage equals length times width times height, or CF = L * W * H. The CF equals cubic feet, L equals length, W equals width and H equals height. The * sign means to multiply.
2. Calculate the example of a rectangular cube that is 10 feet long, 10 feet wide and 5 feet deep or high. This could be a small swimming pool. Using the above formula, it would read as CF = 10 * 10 * 5, which is equal to 500 cubic feet.
3. Find the cubic footage of a round pool or shape. The formula for the area of a circle--the first measurement we must figure out--is as follows: Area is equal to Pi (3.1416) times the radius squared. Radius squared is a simple calculation in which the diameter of the circle is divided by 2 and then multiplied by itself. The actual formula looks like this:
A = 3.1416 * R2
A is equal to area, 3.1416 is Pi (a constant), R is equal to radius (or half the diameter) and 2 means to square the number.
4. Calculate the example of a round pool that is 20 feet in diameter and 5 feet deep. Using the formula A = 3.1416 * R2, it would look like this:
A = 3.1416 * (10) 2
The 10 comes from taking half the diameter of the pool (20 feet). Ten feet squared is equal to 100 square feet. Then multiply Pi or 3.1416 by 100 to get 314.16 square feet. Multiply 314.16 square feet times the 5-foot depth to get the cubic footage. The answer is 1570.8 cubic feet.
5. Convert cubic footage into gallons. The formula for conversion into gallons teaches that 7.48 gallons is equal to 1 cubic foot. In the case of the rectangular pool, multiply 500 cubic feet times 7.48, which equals 3,740 gallons. The round pool will hold a lot more than that: when you multiply 1570.8 cubic feet times 7.48, you get 11,749.5 gallons.
Tags: cubic feet, cubic footage, feet times, round pool, square feet, 1570 cubic