Do you know how big the Sun is? The Sun is 400 times as big as the Moon and 400 times as far away.

Question

The Moon: 2.5mm diameter

a) How big would the Sun be if the Moon were the size shown above?
b) The Sun is actually about 865,000 miles in diameter, so 1 cm of the model represents how many miles?
c) The Moon is about 250,000 miles away from the Earth. To the nearest centimetre, how far would it be from the Earth in our scale model?
d) In this model, how far away from the Earth would the Sun be?

Answer 1

a) If you are building a scale model in which the moon's diameter were 2.5 mm, the sun should be 400 times larger, according to what you have stated.

b) The answer depends upon the scale of your model. You have stated that the moon is 2.5 mm dia in your model. The sun is therefore 1 meter in diameter in the model. 1 cm = 8650 miles

c) Divide 250,000 miles by 8650 miles/cm for the scale model distance.

d) Convert 93,000,000 miles to the scale model distance using the scale factor 8650 miles/cm. (Hint: divide)

Answer 2

Dear drwls,

Thank you soo much for your help! Now I understand how to solve them :) thank you!