Potential inside sphere with empty cavity

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bfusco
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Homework Statement


An insulating sphere of radius R , centered at point A, has uniform chagre density ρ. A spherical cavity of radius R / 2 , centered at point C, is then cut out and left empty, see Fig.

(a) Find magnitude and direction of the electric field at points A and B.

(b) Find the potential at points A and B. Set V(r → ∞) = 0.

(c) Write down an algebraic solution (no integrals!) for E(r) and V (r) for the space outside the larger sphere, r > R. Choose r = 0 at point A, and the radius vector of point C as r = RC .

(question1) in the uploaded file


The Attempt at a Solution


(a)First I want to figure out the volume charge distribution, which I wanted to do by finding the the volume of the whole sphere minus the volume of the cavity.
[tex]\int_V \rho \cdot dVolume = \frac{4}{3}\pi \rho (R^3-\frac{R^3}{8})=\frac{7}{6}\pi R^3 \rho[/tex]

Then to get [itex]E_B[/itex] I wanted to use Gauss' law, but I am not sure how i would set that up because the E field isn't isotropic, so instead I am trying to use the equation for E-field of a volume charge distribution:
[tex]E(r)=k\int \frac{dq \hat{s}}{s^2}[/tex]
Where i just calculated dq. [itex]s^2=R[/itex], but I am not sure what [itex]\hat{s}[/itex] is
 

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thinking about it though, I am pretty sure that what i got for dq is wrong, because i don't think what i did takes into account that the cavity isn't centered at the origin
 
Treat it as one sphere minus another. Find the fields and potentials for each sphere and take the difference.