A little indoor project - scaled solar system model

[Andrew*]

Hi all,

Sorry that I have been very quiet on the forum recently. I have had a long break from Astronomy due to increasing commitments at work, cloudy weather, snowy weather and generally a bit of a dip in enthusiasm for whatever reason.

I recently had the idea to make a scale model solar system when I was in a crystal shop. They had a jasper sphere which looked uncannily like Jupiter, complete with a great red spot.

After a bit of searching I found a sphere for each planet to a scale of 1.5 billion to 1 (1,500km is 1mm) and worked out where each of the planets would be, with the Sun (93cm across) at the centre.

I also used the Google Earth ruler feature to find out where the planets would be in my locality (e.g. Uranus is in the local ASDA) and made little tags for each planet.

Voyager 1 is the farthest a man-made object has reached – it is only 11km away and the size of a bacterium.

Alpha Centauri has a tag as well – that’s the same distance as ¾ the way round Earth.

Further beyond, on this scale, M31’s diameter would be larger than the Sun-Jupiter distance and it would be 18 times as distant.

I have displayed this against a black cloth backdrop in a cabinet, using a push-switch light as the Sun.

I think they're a little cramped in there. I had to arrange them quite carefully that they wouldn't cast shadows against inferior planets.

Ex-planet Pluto is just visible on the extreme right of the above image!

I'm having second thoughts on Saturn as it is so dark. Of all the planets it took the longest time to find because I wanted nicely even bands (which it displays when viewed parallel with the light source. However, it does remind me of the UV images of Saturn's aurora.

Andrew

[spacetrace]

That is awesome! All the hardwork paid off by the looks of it. I have wanted to get myself a working orrery but this is a great idea!

[Macavity]

What a nifty idea! I'm sure you've worked out that the biggest market for crystal balls is the "new-age / pagan" - Where they are used for SCRYING etc. I suspect indeed Tiger's Eye (albeit yellow variety) or Calcite(?) would make a good Saturn!

[ashenlight]

Great idea Andrew and it looks great. You must have alot of patience, I can't imagine the time it must have taken:)

[Lemmy]

That's neat, what a great idea

[Andrew*]

Glad you like it! I find it makes a very attractive ornament and good educational conversation piece too!

What a nifty idea! I'm sure you've worked out that the biggest market for crystal balls is the "new-age / pagan" - Where they are used for SCRYING etc. I suspect indeed Tiger's Eye (albeit yellow variety) or Calcite(?) would make a good Saturn!

Yeah I worked that out - I did have to trawl through quite a lot of very "interesting" websites

The search may go on for another Saturn - but the first took long enough to find!

Andrew

[TheThing]

That's really cool. I like the darker Saturn.

[jgs001]

Very good Andrew, looks amazing. A lot of patience and effort has gone into that.

[Catanonia]

Awesome mate, when are you going to mass produce and merkat it ?

[Andrew*]

Awesome mate, when are you going to mass produce and merkat it ?

when I find a mass source of Saturns! Mind you if I hadn't found Jupiter first that could have been even more difficult as it's larger...

That's really cool. I like the darker Saturn.

Yeah I'm warming to it, although it's not the most obvious colour!

Andrew

[gary1968]

Very nice Andrew, a most unusual model but very effective.

Gary

[yeti monster]

You are going to need a very large bedroom to set them all out correctly...........

[Beulah]

That's a fabulous project, Andrew!! Yes, I can just about see Pluto!

The kids and I have done our own paper mache version of the Solar

system with a couple of comets as well, but it's hanging from our

dining room ceiling with the main light as the sun..

Alas, Pluto was not included....

[Milliways]

WOW thats pretty damn awsome right there well done mate!