Question #daf3a

1 Answer
José F.
Mar 20, 2016

At least 15 L.

Explanation:

This is a tricky question, because the balls will leave empty spaces between them.

If the packing were perfect the packing density would be 0.74. So we not only need to multiply the number of spheres by their volume, but only need to divide by this density.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Close-packing_of_equal_spheres

So you need at least a volume of:

#(144xx4.19)/0.74color(red)(xx0.254^3)=13.36 L# (sorry, but I believe Australia uses the metric system.)

As the packing is not perfect I will take a box of about 15 to 20 L.

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