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Common star 19 EP

42Psi Tau

RA 61.7519° · Dec 29.0013° · star

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Score breakdown

· 5 badges
19 pts · Common
Common 22 pts → Uncommon
  • Naked-eye visible +8
  • Star +3
  • On the zodiac +3
  • Yellow-white F-type star +3
  • Main-sequence star +2
Total score 19

3 more points to reach Uncommon.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Naked-eye visible · +8
  • On the zodiac · +3
  • Yellow-white F-type star · +3
  • Main-sequence star · +2

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads F1V — an F-type star — a little hotter, whiter and shorter-lived than the Sun.
  • Where it is in life. It is on the main sequence, quietly fusing hydrogen in its core exactly as the Sun does.

Sense of scale

  • In perspective. Inside our stellar backyard: every radio broadcast humanity has ever made has already swept past it.

Find it in the sky

  • How to spot it. At magnitude 5.2 you can see it with your own eyes from a dark site, over in Taurus.
  • Northern sky. It rides the northern half of the sky — an easier target the further north you are.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around November — 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. ≈ 1.6 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
3.005
bv
0.359
constellation
Tau
dist ly
90.0236
luminosity
5.4702
mag
5.21
name
42Psi Tau
spect
F1V

About 42Psi Tau

42Psi Tau is a common star. It lies about 90 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Tau, shines at apparent magnitude 5.21 and has spectral type F1V.

Its spectrum reads F1V — an F-type star — a little hotter, whiter and shorter-lived than the Sun.

How to see it

Look for 42Psi Tau in the constellation Tau. At apparent magnitude 5.21, it can be glimpsed with the unaided eye under dark skies.

Like any astronomical target, 42Psi Tau 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 42Psi Tau is a common star

42Psi Tau scores 19 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the common tier. Another 3 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 5 science badges — Star, Naked-eye visible, On the zodiac, Yellow-white F-type star and Main-sequence 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.