Herschel discovered the object and simply noted "stellar". Therefore, the galaxy was probably mistaken for a star. Herschel discovered this galaxy along with many other objects on a single observation, using Beta Andromedae as a reference star. The position noted is correct and off only by approximately 30" from UGC 953, thus the objects are generally viewed as equivalents.[6]John Louis Emil Dreyer, creator of the New General Catalogue, described the galaxy as "faint, small, stellar", still indicating the misidentification of NGC 513 as a star.[5]
One supernova has been observed in NGC 513: SN 2023jpp (type Ia, mag. 17.6).[7]
The galaxy has an apparent size of 0.9 × 0.6 arcmins and a recessional velocity of approximately 5807 kilometers per second. The redshift of 0.01956 allows an estimate of the galaxy's distance using Hubble's law, which puts the object at roughly 260 million light-years from the Sun.[5]
^ abAn object's distance from Earth can be determined using Hubble's law: v=Ho is Hubble's constant (70±5 (km/s)/Mpc). The relative uncertainty Δd/d divided by the distance is equal to the sum of the relative uncertainties of the velocity and v=Ho
