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Trash star 14 EP

HD 40631

RA 90.1716° · Dec 14.9569° · star

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Score breakdown

· 3 badges
14 pts · Trash
Trash 15 pts → Common
  • In Orion's hunting ground +6
  • White A-type star +5
  • Star +3
Total score 14

1 more point to reach Common.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • In Orion's hunting ground · +6
  • White A-type star · +5

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads A0 — 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.

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 8.2 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Orion.
  • 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 December — 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. ≈ 13.1 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).
  • Fastest probe ever. ≈ 1.2 million years even at the Parker Solar Probe's 192 km/s.

Properties

absmag
1.382
bv
0.249
constellation
Ori
dist ly
742.9521
luminosity
24.3893
mag
8.17
name
HD 40631
spect
A0

About HD 40631

HD 40631 is a trash star. It lies about 743 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Ori, shines at apparent magnitude 8.17 and has spectral type A0.

Its spectrum reads A0 — 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 HD 40631 in the constellation Ori. At apparent magnitude 8.17, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 40631 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 40631 is a trash star

HD 40631 scores 14 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the trash tier. Another 1 point would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 3 science badges — Star, In Orion's hunting ground and White A-type 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.