We report on BVI CCD photometry of a field centered in the region of the open cluster NGC 1883 down to V = 21 .
This cluster has never been studied insofar , and we provide for the first time estimates of its fundamental parameters , namely radial extent , age , distance and reddening .
We find that the cluster has a radius of about 2.5 arcmin , and shows signatures of dynamical relaxation .
NGC 1883 is located in the anti-center direction , and exhibits a reddening in the range E ( B - V ) = 0.23 - 0.35 , depending on the metal abundance .
It turns out to be of intermediate-age ( 1 billion years old ) , and quite distant for an open cluster .
In fact it is located 4.8 kpc from the Sun , and more than 13 kpc from the Galactic center .
This results makes NGC 1883 one of the most peripheral old open clusters , with important consequences for the trend of the metallicity with distance in the outer Galactic disk .