Interesting astronomy site

[ffutures]

Ever wonder how big the solar system would be if the sun was a foot across, or whatever? This site has the answers:

http://www.astrocentral.co.uk/solarsystem.html

Go down the page a bit to see how far it is to the stars on the same scale. Puts things into perspective!

Comments

[chronivore.livejournal.com]

Neat!

Maine Model

[ponderoid.livejournal.com]

I like the Maine Solar System Model (http://www.umpi.maine.edu/info/nmms/solar/), 1:93000000 scale. :) If I ever get up that way, those models are high on my "must see" list. :)

That site you linked, they were thinking kind of small when they made the input choice inches or millimeters. If you try to put numbers big enough to match the Maine model (which isn't so easy to do in inches or mm :), the calculated numbers end up so huge they are not very meaningful in feet or meters, and would be better if displayed as miles and kilometers.

*** Ponder

Re: Maine Model

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Sure, but conversion isn't that difficult if you have a spreadsheet or something, and the smaller scale is useful if you want to ram home the idea of interstellar distance without wrapping around the world a few times. We did this for the school where I work based on a 30cm sun, all of the planets are within a mile or so, Alpha Centauri is in Antarctica. Where would Alpha Centauri be on the Maine scale? The moon?

Re: Maine Model

[ponderoid.livejournal.com]

Where would Alpha Centauri be on the Maine scale? The moon?

Not bad, you guessed in the right neighborhood. At that scale, I get ~440000 km to Alpha Centauri, and the Moon averages ~384000 km away from the Earth. :)

*** Ponder