COMMISSION 27 OF THE I. A. U.
         INFORMATION BULLETIN ON VARIABLE STARS
                     Number 2616

                                    Konkoly Observatory
                                    Budapest
                                    29 October 1984

                                    HU ISSN 0374 - 0676





       THE BRIGHT ECLIPSING BINARY HD 208496


  HD 208496 = HR 8369 (spectral type F3V) is a bright eclipsing 
binary which has received little attention up to now.
It is not listed in the General Catalogue of Variable Stars
though the 1982 edition of the Bright Stars mentions it as a
suspected eclipsing binary.
  Manfroid and Renson (1983) used it as a comparison for the
CP star HD 208217 in a photometric observing run in September
1981 with the ESO 50 cm Danish Telescope. From 15 points they
derived a possible period of 0.73 day and a range of more than
0.2 magn. in u,v,b and y.
   More observations were obtained in July 1984 at the ESO 1m
telescope. The star was caught twice in a descending phase and
was then followed to a minimum. Unfortunately only a few points
were taken in the ascending phases.
   Analysis by the Stellingwerf method and examination of the
phase diagram gives a frequency of :

  f = 0.683038 +- n (0.000965) d^-1  n = 0, 1, 2, 3.

the error on f being about 0.000005 d^-1
   The y lightcurve corresponding to f = 0.683038 d^-1
(P = 1.464047 d) is presented in Fig. 1.
   The colors show only small variations, within the observational 
errors. Although the phase coverage is less than uniform,
we suspect an asymmetry in the shape of the secondary minimum.
Clearly additional data are needed in order to confirm it.

                    [FIGURE 1]

Figure 1 Phase diagram for HD 208496 in y. (+ September 1981;
x July 1984). The period is 1.464047 d.


                 J. MANFROID

             Institut d'Astrophysique
             5, avenue de Cointe
             B-4200 Liege-Ougree
             Belgium

                 G. MATHYS

             Institut fur Astronomie
             ETH-Zentrum
             CH-8092 Zurich
             Switzerland


Reference:

Manfroid, J. and Renson, P. , 1983, IAU 
   Inform. Bull. Var. Stars, No. 2311.