Converting Gallons to quarts pints and cups

How many cups are in
3 and 1/2 gallons?

So before even addressing this
question, let's just think

about how large a cup is.

Actually, I'll give you a little
bit of overview of how

many cups there are in a pint,
how many pints in a quart, and

how many quarts in a gallon.

Let me just draw a cube here,
and let's imagine

that this is a gallon.

The most common time we see
a gallon is when you see a

gallon of milk.

So let's say that that whole
thing is a gallon.

You can imagine if it had a
handle, it would be kind of a

big gallon of milk.

Now, there are 4 quarts
per gallon.

Let me write this over here.

There are 4 quarts per gallon.

So if I were to draw the quarts
here, I could divide

this gallon into 4 quarts, and
then each of these sections

would be a quart.

So you would have 4 quarts.

So this right here that I've
just drawn in blue would be

exactly 1 quart.

And obviously, there's 4 of them
in this entire gallon.

Now, you can divide the
quarts into pints.

You have 2 pints per quart.

So this quart that I drew here,
I can divide it into 2,

like that, and this little
section that I'm highlighting

in magenta is a pint.

That is a pint right
over there.

And then finally, there
are 2 cups per pint.

So this pint right here, I can
divide it into 2, and each of

these will be a cup.

So this section right
here will be a cup.

Now, we can go straight and
figure out exactly how many

cups there are per gallon.

Actually, that might be
an interesting way

to think about it.

If you have 4 quarts-- let's
multiply it right here.

So you have 4 quarts per gallon

times 2 pints per quart.

What does this give you?

This gives you 4 times
2 is equal to 8.

And then the quarts cancel
out, and you

have 8 pints per gallon.

And that makes complete sense
because we had 4 quarts in

this gallon, and then
each of those quarts

have 2 pints in them.

So 4 times 2.

So 8 pints per gallon.

And then we can multiply that
times 2 cups per pint.

So I could just copy and
paste this right here.

Actually, I should've
cut and paste.

Let me select it again.

I want to do that so I get
that real estate back.

So edit, cut, edit, paste.

There you go.

So now you multiply this
times 2 cups per pint.

And the reason why this will
work is because you have pints

in the numerator.

It cancels out with the pints
in the denominator.

And you will be left with-- I'll
go back to the yellow-- 8

times 2 is 16.

In the numerator, we have
cups per gallon.

Now, we just figured how many
cups there are per gallon.

That makes sense.

This section right here is
exactly 1/16 of this entire

cube, this entire gallon.

But we haven't even answered
our question.

We want to figure out how
many cups there are

in 3 and 1/2 gallons.

So let's write it over here.

So we're concerned with
3 and 1/2 gallons.

I don't like working
with mixed numbers.

I like to turn them into
improper fractions.

3 and 1/2 is the same thing as
2 times 3 is 6, plus 1 is 7.

This is the same thing as 7/2.

If you divided 7 by 2, you would
get 3 with a remainder

of 1, or this would be
3 and 1/2, so this is

the exact same thing.

So we want to know how many
cups are in 7/2 gallons.

So what we want to do is end up
with cups, and we want the

gallons to cancel out.

So we have gallons in the
numerator right here.

It's definitely not in
the denominator.

And so we want to divide
by gallons.

And then we're going to
have a numerator.

We have cups in the numerator.

And how many cups are
there per gallon?

Well, we just figured
that out.

There are 16 cups per gallon.

When you multiply these two
quantities, the gallons will

cancel out, and you'll just be
left with cups, and that's

what we wanted.

So it's going to be
7/2 times 16.

So this is going to be
7 times 16/2 cups.

You could divide 16
by 2 to get 8.

2 divided by 2 is 1.

So it just becomes 7 times 8
divided by 1, or just 7 times

8, which is 56.

So this is equal to 56 cups.

And this should make sense.

This should be a much larger
number because cups are a much

smaller unit.

So if you have 3 and 1/2
gallons, you will have many,

many, many more cups in that
3 and 1/2 gallons,

so this makes sense.