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Common star 18 EP

HD 238029

RA 175.4023° · Dec 56.7119° · 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

Hard to believe

  • True brightness. It pours out about 1.7 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 K7 — a K-type star. Orange K dwarfs are the marathon runners of the galaxy, burning steadily for tens of billions of years.

Find it in the sky

  • How to spot it. At magnitude 9.3 you'll want a small backyard telescope, over in Ursa Major.
  • 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 March — that's when to go looking.

Its true colour

  • Its true colour. Measured through blue and visual filters it comes out deep orange-red (B−V 1.6) — one of the coolest surfaces a star can have while still fusing.

By the numbers

  • Surface temperature. Its colour puts the surface at roughly 3650 K, against the Sun's 5778 K.

What's in a name

  • Its catalogue. The HD number is from the Henry Draper Catalogue, in which Annie Jump Cannon personally classified the spectra of nearly 400,000 stars — still the largest such feat by one person.

Properties

absmag
-10.72
bv
1.6
constellation
UMa
luminosity
1690440.9316
mag
9.28
name
HD 238029
spect
K7

About HD 238029

HD 238029 is a common star. It sits in the constellation UMa, shines at apparent magnitude 9.28 and has spectral type K7.

Its spectrum reads K7 — 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 238029 in the constellation UMa. At apparent magnitude 9.28, a small backyard telescope will bring it into view.

Like any astronomical target, HD 238029 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 238029 is a common star

HD 238029 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.