The second Cape Photographic Catalogue on the Hipparcos system

The Second Cape Photographic Catalogue (CPC2) is an astrometric, photograph ic catalog covering the entire Southern Hemisphere to a limiting magnitude of about 10.5. The Hipparcos Catalogue has been used for a new, plate-by-pl ate, rigorous reduction. A significant improvement over the release 1 versi on of the data was achieved. With an average accuracy of 53 mas and a mean epoch of 1968, the CPC2 is a key catalog for proper-motion determination. T his release 2 of the CPC2 contains high-quality positions of 266,629 stars and an appendix of 8040 other stars. Catalog reduction and construction det ails are given, as well as a description of the final product, which is ava ilable from the US Naval Observatory.