Project 2: Conversions

Part 1 — Currency Conversion Choose a product for which you can find a variety of prices on-line at different retail stores (such as a consumer item, like a 50-inch LED television or a tube of lip gloss) or with different brands (such as a smartphone or a pair of soccer cleats). This item will become your new currency unit.
Currency Unit:
Determine the cost of your currency unit by looking up its price in at least six different on-line retailers or with at least six different brands. If you are using different on-line retailers for a specific item, try to get a mixture of types of stores (discount, on-line only, and high-end). If you are using different brands for an item, be sure to make the items as similar as possible (with regard to size, features, quality, etc.) Retailer or BrandPrice
Average these costs to get the average price of your currency unit (round to the nearest penny):Average Price:
Determine the price of each of the following items in terms of your new currency units. For example, how many Olive Garden Lasagnas would be needed to purchase a used Honda, or how many 50-inch LED televisions would be needed to buy a three-bedroom house? Be sure to use the correct number of significant figures!!
Item Cost of item in
terms of your unit.
2015 Honda Civic in good condition ($15,990)
Non-stop round-trip flight, Philadelphia to London ($703)
3-bedroom home in Willow Grove, PA ($469,800)
One dozen grade A large eggs ($3.28)
Front mezzanine ticket to Wicked on Broadway ($165.50)
14-inch MacBook Pro M3 in Space Black ($4299)
Typical tankful (12 gallons) of regular gasoline ($48.36)

Which of these exchanges surprised you the most, and which one feels like the best deal? Is it really better than the other exchanges? What makes you think so, or think not?

Part 2 — Map Reading when printed, is at a scale of 1:6400, which means that one of any unit on the map is equivalent to 6400 of the same unit at the location depicted in the map. In other words, one inch on the map is 6400 inches on location, and one centimeter on the map is 6400 centimeters on location. The map also appears at the end of chapter 2 of my Introduction to QR textbook.

The button will open the map in a new tab or new window. If you choose to display the map on your computer screen, the image will needed to be exactly 6.5 inches (16.5 centimeters) wide for the scaling to be correct.

Use a ruler to measure the distances on the map and then determine the actual distances at the location in the units requested. Assume the scale of 1:6400 is exact (but do not assume your ruler will be exact, so round accordingly). It should not matter whether you choose to measure in inches or centimeters, as long as you calculate your unit conversions correctly.
MeasurementActual
Distance
Measure the distance on the map between the traffic lights on Pennsylvania route 232, and calculate the actual distance at the location in feet. ft
Measure the dimensions of General Nelson Field on the map, calculate the actual dimensions at the location in meters, and then multiply to get the area of General Nelson Field.  Length  m
 Width  m
 Area  multiply... m
Measure the straight-line distance from Glencairn Museum to the cottages on the map, and calculate the actual distance at the location in kilometers. km
Measure the combined (curved) length of Campus Drive and College Drive between the boxes following the dotted path, then calculate the actual distance at the location in miles. mi
If you wanted to run a 100-yard dash on Tomlinson Road, how far apart would the start and finish lines be on the map? (use inches or centimeters) 100 yards
Bonus Question: Imagine a topographical map which shows the maximum width of the Grand Canyon being 2.9 centimeters. If the actual maximum width of the Grand Canyon is 18 miles, what would be the approximate scale of this map?
1 :

Once completed, this page to a pdf document; then hand it in through your course's Learning Management System.

 Neil Simonetti

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