Pyramids
Andrew Gloag
Bill Zahner
Dan Greenberg
Jim Sconyers
Lori Jordan
Victor Cifarelli
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Printed: November 20, 2012
AUTHORS
Andrew Gloag
Bill Zahner
Dan Greenberg
Jim Sconyers
Lori Jordan
Victor Cifarelli
EDITOR
Annamaria Farbizio
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C ONCEPT
Concept 1. Pyramids
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Pyramids
Here you’ll learn what a pyramid is and how to find its volume and surface area.
What if you were given a solid three-dimensional figure with one base and lateral faces that meet at a common
vertex? How could you determine how much two-dimensional and three-dimensional space that figure occupies?
After completing this Concept, you’ll be able to find the surface area and volume of a pyramid.
Watch This
MEDIA
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PyramidsCK-12
Guidance
A pyramid is a solid with one base and lateral faces that meet at a common vertex. The edges between the lateral
faces are lateral edges. The edges between the base and the lateral faces are base edges.
A regular pyramid is a pyramid where the base is a regular polygon. All regular pyramids also have a slant height,
which is the height of a lateral face. A non-regular pyramid does not have a slant height.
Surface Area
Surface area is a two-dimensional measurement that is the total area of all surfaces that bound a solid. The basic
unit of area is the square unit. For pyramids, we will need to use the slant height, which is labeled l, to find the area
of each triangular face.
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Surface Area of a Regular Pyramid: If B is the area of the base, and n is the number of triangles, then SA =
B + 12 nbl.
The net shows the surface area of a pyramid. If you ever forget the formula, use the net.
Volume
To find the volume of any solid you must figure out how much space it occupies. The basic unit of volume is the
cubic unit.
Volume of a Pyramid: V = 13 Bh where B is the area of the base.
Example A
Find the slant height of the square pyramid.
The slant height is the hypotenuse of the right triangle formed by the height and half the base length. Use the
Pythagorean Theorem.
82 + 242 = l 2
640 = l 2
√
√
l = 640 = 8 10
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Concept 1. Pyramids
Example B
Find the surface area of the pyramid from Example A.
√ √
= 2(16) 8 10 = 256 10. To find the total surface
√
area, we also need the area of the base, which is 162 = 256. The total surface area is 256 10+256 ≈ 1065.54 units2 .
The total surface area of the four triangular faces is 4
1
2 bl
Example C
Find the volume of the pyramid.
V = 31 (122 )12 = 576 units3
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PyramidsCK-12
Guided Practice
1. Find the surface area of the regular triangular pyramid.
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2. If the lateral surface area of a regular square pyramid is 72 f t 2 and the base edge is equal to the slant height. What
is the length of the base edge?
3. Find the height and then volume of the pyramid.
4. Find the volume of the pyramid with a right triangle as its base.
5. A rectangular pyramid has a base area of 56 cm2 and a volume of 224 cm3 . What is the height of the pyramid?
Answers:
1. “Regular” tells us the base is an equilateral triangle. Let’s draw it and find its area.
√
√
B = 21 · 8 · 4 3 = 16 3
The surface area is:
√
√
SA = 16 3 + 12 · 3 · 8 · 18 = 16 3 + 216 ≈ 243.71
2. In the formula for surface area, the lateral surface area is 12 nbl. We know that n = 4 and b = l. Let’s solve for b.
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Concept 1. Pyramids
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nbl = 72 f t 2
2
1
(4)b2 = 72
2
2b2 = 72
b2 = 36
b = 6 f eet
3. In this example, we are given the slant height. Use the Pythagorean Theorem.
72 + h2 = 252
h2 = 576
h = 24
V = 13 (142 )(24) = 1568 units3 .
4. The base of the pyramid is a right triangle. The area of the base is 12 (14)(8) = 56 units2 .
V = 31 (56)(17) ≈ 317.33 units3
5. Use the formula for volume and plug in the information we were given. Then solve for the height.
1
V = Bh
3
1
224 = · 56h
3
12 = h
Practice
Fill in the blanks about the diagram to the left.
1. x is the ___________.
2. The slant height is ________.
3. y is the ___________.
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4. The height is ________.
5. The base is _______.
6. The base edge is ________.
For questions 7-8, sketch each of the following solids and answer the question. Your drawings should be to scale,
but not one-to-one. Leave your answer in simplest radical form.
7. Draw a square pyramid with an edge length of 9 in and a 12 in height. Find the slant height.
8. Draw an equilateral triangle pyramid with an edge length of 6 cm and a height of 6 cm. What is the height of
the base?
Find the slant height, l, of one lateral face in each pyramid. Round your answer to the nearest hundredth.
9.
10.
Find the surface area and volume of the regular pyramid. Round your answers to the nearest hundredth.
11.
12.
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Concept 1. Pyramids
13.
14.
15.
16.
17. A regular tetrahedron has four equilateral triangles as its faces.
a. Find the height of one of the faces if the edge length is 6 units.
b. Find the area of one face.
c. Find the total surface area of the regular tetrahedron.
18. If the surface area of a square pyramid is 40 f t 2 and the base edge is 4 ft, what is the slant height?
19. If the lateral area of a square pyramid is 800 in2 and the slant height is 16 in, what is the length of the base
edge?
20. If the lateral area of a regular triangle pyramid is 252 in2 and the base edge is 8 in, what is the slant height?
21. The volume of a square pyramid is 72 square inches and the base edge is 4 inches. What is the height?
22. The volume of a triangle pyramid is 170 in3 and the base area is 34 in2 . What is the height of the pyramid?
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