so i was just sitting at the desk doing some paperwork or whatever and had the radio on kind of in the background and all of a sudden 10 meters just absolutely lit up around 2pm local time. i was hearing stations from south america, a few european signals that were surprisingly strong for this time of year, and even picked up what sounded like a ZL station for a few minutes before it faded. honestly wasnt expecting much given how the last couple weeks have been kind of flat but propagation does what it wants i guess.

anyway while i was chasing those contacts i also saw that Icom apparently officially announced the IC-905 is going to start shipping to dealers in the US sometime next month according to a couple distributors i follow. the microwave bands thing is really interesting to me even if i dont have a good setup for that stuff yet. anyone pre-ordered one or know more about actual availability? feels like these announcements always take longer than they say.

also heard theres a regional hamfest coming up in the midwest, some guys on the local repeater were talking about it but i didnt catch all the details. if anyone knows which one they meant id be curious.

yeah i caught part of that opening too, was working 28.400 and logged about a dozen south american stations in maybe 45 minutes which for a wednesday afternoon is pretty decent. missed the ZL completely but a buddy of mine two counties over said he worked a couple JA stations which i was jealous of. solar flux has been creeping up again so im thinking we might get a few more of these before the month is out.

on the IC-905, ive been watching that one for a while. the 10ghz capability is what gets me even if the transverter approach adds cost and complexity. talked to a guy at a club meeting who said his dealer told him late next month is realistic but who knows. those things slip constantly. the 23cm and 13cm bands are still pretty quiet around here so it would be nice to have more people with gear that can do those freqs.

no idea which hamfest they were talking about on your repeater, there are like three or four in that region in the fall season. might be the one in Davenport but im guessing.

omg i didnt even have my radio on yesterday i was at work, gutted to hear about that 10m opening. im still pretty new to all this and havent actually worked a dx contact yet so every time i hear about a good opening i feel like im missing out. is there a good way to know when these are happening ahead of time or is it just kind of random luck? i check dxmaps sometimes but im not always sure what im looking at honestly.