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Common variable star 17 EP

HR 6871

RA 276.3818° · Dec -63.0215° · star

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Score breakdown

· 5 badges
17 pts · Common
Common 22 pts → Uncommon
  • Variable star +5
  • White A-type star +5
  • A named variable star +3
  • Main-sequence star +2
  • Barely variable (under 0.05 mag) +2
Total score 17

5 more points to reach Uncommon.

Badges

  • Variable star · +5
  • White A-type star · +5
  • Main-sequence star · +2
  • Barely variable (under 0.05 mag) · +2
  • A named variable star · +3

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads A3V — an A-type star: white-hot, typically about twice the Sun's mass, and the class most of the sky's famous bright stars belong to.
  • Where it is in life. It is on the main sequence, quietly fusing hydrogen in its core exactly as the Sun does.
  • It changes. This star does not hold still: its brightness rises and falls on a rhythm of hours, days or years, either pulsing in size or being eclipsed by a companion.

Sense of scale

  • In perspective. Far away by human standards, yet still a local address inside the Milky Way's spiral arms.

Find it in the sky

  • How to spot it. At magnitude 6.1 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Pavo.
  • Southern sky only. So far south it never rises for most of the northern hemisphere. To see it you'd have to travel to Chile, South Africa or Australia.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around June — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

  • Verdict. Hopelessly far for any craft humanity can build today.

Properties

absmag
1.868
bv
0.202
constellation
Pav
dist ly
232.1396
luminosity
15.5883
mag
6.13
name
HR 6871
spect
A3V
var amplitude
0.04
var designation
V346
var max
6.11
var min
6.15

About HR 6871

HR 6871 is a common variable star. It lies about 232.1 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Pav, shines at apparent magnitude 6.13 and has spectral type A3V.

Its spectrum reads A3V — an A-type star: white-hot, typically about twice the Sun's mass, and the class most of the sky's famous bright stars belong to.

How to see it

Look for HR 6871 in the constellation Pav. At apparent magnitude 6.13, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HR 6871 is best seen from a dark site away from city lights, and when it is above the horizon depends on your latitude and the time of year. The visibility panel above works out tonight's viewing window for your saved location.

Why HR 6871 is a common variable star

HR 6871 scores 17 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the common tier. Another 5 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 5 science badges — Variable star, White A-type star, Main-sequence star, Barely variable (under 0.05 mag) and A named variable star — each earned for a real, measurable property of the object. Rarity on Spacedle is never random: the more remarkable an object's astrophysics, the more badges it collects, the higher it scores, and the rarer it ranks.