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Common star 18 EP

HD 66291

RA 120.4552° · Dec -28.4079° · star

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Score breakdown

· 3 badges
18 pts · Common
Common 22 pts → Uncommon
  • Bright giant +12
  • Star +3
  • Orange K-type star +3
Total score 18

4 more points to reach Uncommon.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Orange K-type star · +3
  • Bright giant · +12

Trivia

Hard to believe

  • True brightness. It pours out about 3.5 million times as much light as the Sun. It only looks ordinary because it is so far away.

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads K1II/IIICNp — 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 bright giant, well on its way to the largest stars there are.

Find it in the sky

  • How to spot it. At magnitude 8.5 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Puppis.
  • 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 January — that's when to go looking.

Its true colour

  • Its true colour. Measured through blue and visual filters it comes out orange (B−V 1.3) — cooler than the Sun, and the kind of star that burns steadily for tens of billions of years.

By the numbers

  • Surface temperature. Its colour puts the surface at roughly 4110 K, against the Sun's 5778 K.

Properties

absmag
-11.54
bv
1.309
constellation
Pup
luminosity
3597493.3516
mag
8.46
name
HD 66291
spect
K1II/IIICNp

Nearby objects

About HD 66291

HD 66291 is a common star. It sits in the constellation Pup, shines at apparent magnitude 8.46 and has spectral type K1II/IIICNp.

Its spectrum reads K1II/IIICNp — 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 66291 in the constellation Pup. At apparent magnitude 8.46, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 66291 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 66291 is a common star

HD 66291 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 3 science badges — Star, Orange K-type star and Bright giant — 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.