so ive been noticing 10 meters has been doing some really strange things the past couple weeks and i cant quite figure out if its just me or if conditions are actually as weird as they seem. some days i can work europe no problem from here in the midwest, like legit 59 signals out of nowhere, and then other days the band sounds completely dead and i cant even hear anything from out west let alone across the pond.

i've been checking the solar flux numbers on spaceweather.com and they've been bouncing around a lot, like anywhere from the low 150s up to 190 something and then crashing back down. does that kind of variation normally cause this much inconsistency or is something else going on? im wondering if im missing something about how to read the conditions before i get on.

also had a weird experience last tuesday where i worked a guy in japan around noon local time on 10m with like a 5 watt qrp setup and then an hour later the band was completely gone. no warning, no gradual fade, just gone. is that normal for this part of the solar cycle?

yeah 10m has been like that all season honestly, dont get too frustrated by it. what youre describing with the Japan contact and then the band dying is actually pretty classic for sporadic-E combined with F2 propagation at this point in the cycle. they can stack sometimes and give you these incredible short windows that feel almost random.

the solar flux thing is real though -- anything above like 150 and 10m starts getting interesting, but the K-index matters just as much if not more. if the K-index spikes above 4 or 5 after a CME, all bets are off and even a high flux day can be garbage for DX. i usually check both before i sit down for a session. DXmaps.com is also really useful for seeing in real time where the openings actually are instead of just guessing from the indices.

that qrp Japan contact is seriously impressive by the way, save that one in your log and brag about it a little, you earned it.

this is actually something I've been trying to understand better myself so thanks for posting. I only got my general like 8 months ago and the propagation stuff still kind of confuses me. I downloaded the VOACAP app somebody on here recommended and its helping a little but honestly half the time the predictions dont match what i actually hear on the radio so i just get on and see what happens lol

one thing i did notice is that pskreporter is really good for seeing where your signal is reaching even when you dont hear anything back, gave me a better feel for when the band is actually open vs when i just wasnt hearing the other station