Geneva photometry of HD 23642

The preferred distance is 138.0+/-1.5pc for a reddening of E(B-V)=0.025+/-0.003. The reddening value is larger than the 0.012 adopted in the recent works on this stars by Munari et al. (2004A&A...418L..31M) and Southworth et al. (2005A&A...429..645S), and smaller than other values in the literature for the cluster reddening. The distance is in agreement with other recent works on the distance to the Pleiades.

A comparison with evolutionary models suggests that the inclusion of convective core overshoot gives a much better fit to the empirical mass-radius relationship obtained from the binary analysis. Both this comparison and the "spectral disentangling" are consistent with HD 23642 having [Fe/H]=+0.06, a value determined by the most recent spectroscopical analyses of Pleiades stars.