How much is inside a pack of gum? More precisely, how much gum is in a
Plen-T-Pak of Wrigley's Juicy Fruit Chewing Gum? Nobody knows for sure,
but on Wednesday, Holly and I decided to find out.
|
 Gum
is the only commodity that I know of that comes in 17-packs. The
unopened packs are the perfect-sized gum package.
A pack costs about 89 cents US.
|
 With
the waterproof yellow package opened, a magazine of chewing gum can be
found underneath. Each stick of gum is wrapped in aluminum foil at the
Wrigley gum factory. They use hundreds of tiny rolls of aluminum foil. |
 Packs
of gum come in many flavors to suit individual tastes. My personal
preference is for the unfiltered menthols.
|
 Each
piece of foil is marked with a serial number just like handguns and
motorcycles. |
 |
 |
 Laid
out like Doritos, a pack of gum covers about 36 square inches, or a
quarter foot. |
  Placed
end to end, they stretch to 48 7/8ths inches. ..about four feet of gum. A
roll of bubble tape is a third longer, at six feet, one inch in length, but costs
more than twice as much (US$2). |
 Personally,
I refill my bubbletape container the economical way, by taping 25 sticks
of gum together! |
 |
|
|
 The
unchewed block of gum has a volume of 2.6 cubic inches. Most of this mass
is made up of sugar. By chewing the gum until it has lost it's
sweetness, I will be swallowing the sugar. Only the gum base will be
left. |
 Gum
should be eaten much like a stack of pancakes. I like mine with
butter, blueberries and maple syrup.
What a great way to start the morning! |
    Here
is an array of photos showing me chewing the gum. |
    I
left out the ones of me throwing up. |
 TaaDaa!
30 minutes later, the gum had magically transformed |
 The
flavorless block of chewed gum is only 0.68 cubic inches in volume,
meaning that while chewing, I ate 1.95 cubic inches of sugar!
These measurements led me to come up with a simple formula for gum volume: (PlenT = 3.78abc) |
 The
wad of gum is about the size of a wine bottle cork. |
 When
you chew gum, be sure to keep the 17 little pieces of foil to re-wrap the
wad of gum, otherwise it may result in shoe damage or loss. |
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