Can someone tell me, why the volume of a cone is 1/3∩r2h (i.e., 1/3 times the volume of a cylinder) ?
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4 Answers
well it can be proved with help of calculus.
see some posts here
http://in.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20091227052735AAbTTa2
here it goes
first think about the shape of a cone.
isn't it like vertically gathering some cylinder of negligible height and decreasing radius?
so we will try to find volume of these cylinders and then sum it up
let us choose a cylinder of height dx(very small) which is at a distance x from the top of the cone.(see figure)
let y be the radius of the cylinder .
so we have x/y = h/r
or, y= xr/h
now we can surely find the volume of that cylinder,let us call it dV(very small)
so dV= \Pi y^2 dx \Rightarrow dV= \Pi (x^2r^2/h^2)dx
as you can see if x ranges from 0 to h(height of the cylinder) we can cover the whole cone or say we can make a cone
so if we are to find the volume of the cone we will just integrate with lower limit 0 and upper limit h
so volume of the cone v = ∫dv = \int_{0}^{h}{} \Pi (x^2 r^2 /h^2)dx = \Pi ( r^2/h^2) \int_{0}^{h}{} x^2 dx = 1/3 \Pi r^2 h
note that \int_{0}^{h}{} x^2dx = h^3/3