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Common star 21 EP

HD 198649

RA 313.0899° · Dec -21.2309° · star

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Score breakdown

· 5 badges
21 pts · Common
Common 22 pts → Uncommon
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) +6
  • Giant star +6
  • Star +3
  • On the zodiac +3
  • Orange K-type star +3
Total score 21

1 more point to reach Uncommon.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) · +6
  • On the zodiac · +3
  • Orange K-type star · +3
  • Giant star · +6

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads K0IIICNp... — a K-type star. Orange K dwarfs are the marathon runners of the galaxy, burning steadily for tens of billions of years.
  • Where it is in life. It is a giant. It has already exhausted its core hydrogen and swollen up enormously in response.

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 7.4 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Capricornus.
  • Southern sky. It rides the southern half of the sky — an easier target the further south you are.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around August — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

  • Verdict. Impossible with our current technology — and the next millennium of it.

Getting there

  • Aboard Voyager 1. ≈ 20.7 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
-0.428
bv
1.046
constellation
Cap
dist ly
1177.4584
luminosity
129.1814
mag
7.36
name
HD 198649
spect
K0IIICNp...

About HD 198649

HD 198649 is a common star. It lies about 1,177.5 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Cap, shines at apparent magnitude 7.36 and has spectral type K0IIICNp....

Its spectrum reads K0IIICNp... — 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 198649 in the constellation Cap. At apparent magnitude 7.36, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 198649 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 198649 is a common star

HD 198649 scores 21 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the common tier. Another 1 point would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 5 science badges — Star, Distant (over 1,000 light-years), On the zodiac, Orange K-type star and Giant 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.