Somewhat inspired by "Dog Orrery". The discussions therein made
it
clear that ordinary orreries lack astronomical verisimilitude,
operating as they do with circular orbits in a single plane.
So.
The MaxCo Proper Copper Orrery Company of Oregon (currently
seeking venture capital and, indeed,
a potential customer) is
working on a scheme to create an actual-reality orrery in orbit.
We are starting with a one-ton sun, which will of course be
painted
yellow as it is meant to be. This will be put into orbit in a quiet
part
of the solar system, as free as possible from the gravitational tugs
of
real planets. (By keeping the whole thing fairly small, we hope to
minimize tidal forces.)
The planets will be made to scale in both size and mass (using
various combinations of lead, copper and aerospace-grade papier
mache), and each will be tenderly launched on an orbit around the
sun, assuming a start-date of Jan04 1643, midnight GMT.
Setting the scale-moons (each individually carved by former
jewellers) on precisely the right courses will be phenomenally
difficult, but we are working on that, and are 100% confident that
we might succeed.
We haven't entirely solved the problems associated with Saturn,
and
we aren't even thinking about the rings around Uranus yet, but rest
assured that a solution will be found.
The fleet-minded amongst you will have realized that, with a 1-
ton
sun, and with distances to scale, the speed of the orrery will
be....well, OK, no point stating the obvious, I know.
[STOP PRESS: The technicians at The MaxCo Proper Copper Orrery
Company of Oregon have just woken up to the principle of
reversibility. We have therefore decided to set everything moving
in a retrograde manner, so that the Proper Copper Orrery will, in
fact, recapitulate the past history of the solar system, running
backwards from 1643.]