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Common star 18 EP

HD 196541

RA 308.3539° · Dec 69.6715° · star

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Score breakdown

· 4 badges
18 pts · Common
Common 22 pts → Uncommon
  • Deep red star +8
  • Never sets (northern circumpolar) +4
  • Star +3
  • Orange K-type star +3
Total score 18

4 more points to reach Uncommon.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Never sets (northern circumpolar) · +4
  • Orange K-type star · +3
  • Deep red star · +8

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads K0 — a K-type star. Orange K dwarfs are the marathon runners of the galaxy, burning steadily for tens of billions of years.

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 7.7 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Draco.
  • Never sets. So far north that from Britain, Canada or northern Europe it never dips below the horizon — it is up every clear night of the year.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around July — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

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

Getting there

  • Aboard Voyager 1. ≈ 14.7 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).
  • Fastest probe ever. ≈ 1.3 million years even at the Parker Solar Probe's 192 km/s.

Properties

absmag
0.605
bv
1.408
constellation
Dra
dist ly
836.2976
luminosity
49.8884
mag
7.65
name
HD 196541
spect
K0

About HD 196541

HD 196541 is a common star. It lies about 836.3 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Dra, shines at apparent magnitude 7.65 and has spectral type K0.

Its spectrum reads K0 — a K-type star. Orange K dwarfs are the marathon runners of the galaxy, burning steadily for tens of billions of years.

How to see it

Look for HD 196541 in the constellation Dra. At apparent magnitude 7.65, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 196541 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 HD 196541 is a common star

HD 196541 scores 18 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the common tier. Another 4 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 4 science badges — Star, Never sets (northern circumpolar), Orange K-type star and Deep red 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.