Solar System Model

It might help to get some idea of the scale of the solar system if you make a model of it. Use a football as the Sun, and find or make objects the sizes shown in this diagram of the planets. For the asteroids and the comets you can use grains of sand.

Place your planets at the distances given in this table to make your scale model.

Object	Diameter	Distance from Sun
Sun	22 cm	0
Mercury	1 mm	9 m
Venus	2 mm	17 m
Earth	2 mm	24 m
Mars	1 mm	36 m
Asteroids		75m
Jupiter	23 mm	123 m
Saturn	19 mm	226 m
Uranus	8 mm	454 m
Neptune	8 mm	711 m
Pluto	0.4 mm	932 m
Comets		1,000 km

m means meters and km means kilometers. 1km = 1000m.

Alternatively you can use our on-line Solar System Model Maker to plan your own model using any scale you chose, and drag the Sun and planets to the place you want them on a map anywhere in the world.

You might like to know that in your model 1m represents 5.6 billion meters in the solar system.