A homogeneously charged pyramid

Consider a regular pyramid charged with constant volume charge density. The potential at point P, the top of the pyramid is 1 V 1V . What would be the potential at point P if we removed the top part, so the pyramid is instead truncated at a height h = 0.6 H h=0.6 H ?

Hint: You don't need to do any integration, but instead can deduce the result logically.


The answer is 0.84.

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2 solutions

Discussions for this problem are now closed

Rushikesh Jogdand
May 20, 2014

The pyramid is charged with constant volume density. The word CONSTANT means 1 V is potential of whole pyramid. Hence, all that we have to calculate is the volume of remaining part of the pyramid. By assuming different dimensions I found that the part to be cutted has volume ratio 4 : 25 with the normal one. Hence, according to me , by this angle of logic the answer is \frac{21}{25} = 0.84

David Mattingly Staff
May 13, 2014

First let us determine what is the relation between the potential at point P and the height H of the pyramid. From dimensional analysis we have that V p Q H ρ V H H 3 H = H 2 . V_{p} \sim \frac{Q}{H} \sim \frac{\rho V}{H} \sim \frac{ H^{3}}{H}=H^{2}. Thus, we can write V p ( H ) = C p y r H 2 V_{p}(H)= C_{pyr} H^{2} where C p y r C_{pyr} is a constant that does not depend on H. This observation is sufficient to determine the potential V p V'_{p} at point P when the pyramid is truncated. In fact, note that V p ( H ) = V p ( H h ) + V p V p = C p y r ( H 2 ( H h ) 2 ) = ( 1 ( 1 h / H ) 2 ) Volts . V_{p}(H)= V_{p}(H-h) +V'_{p} \Rightarrow V'_{p}= C_{pyr}(H^{2}- (H-h)^{2})= (1-(1-h/H)^2) \textrm{Volts}. Here, we used of the fact that the potential when h = 0 h=0 is 1 V 1V . Clearly, the same solution may be obtained by integration. You'll probably agree that our method is less tedious.

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