so yesterday afternoon i was just doing some casual monitoring on 10m and holy cow it just lit up around 2pm local time. i was pulling in stations from south america like they were next door, worked a couple guys in brazil and one in argentina without even really trying. running maybe 50 watts into a dipole up about 25 feet so nothing special at all. cycle 25 is really delivering lately and i feel like a lot of people are sleeping on 10m still because they got used to it being dead for so long.

also on a completely different note, has anyone been following the new icom ic-905 stuff? i know its been out a little while but i finally got to mess around with one at the club meeting last thursday and the microwave bands capability is just wild. not sure i have any practical use for it living in the suburbs but it was cool to see. and apparently yaesu has been dropping hints about something new too, saw a thread on another forum but couldnt find much solid info, might just be rumors.

anyway just wanted to share the 10m thing because its worth getting on if you havent lately. even a simple wire antenna is working great right now.

yeah 10m has been crazy good lately, i noticed the same thing a few weeks ago and now i basically have it on in the background whenever im in the shack. worked japan on it last week which honestly still feels surreal to me, im used to needing 20m for that kind of distance. the solar numbers have been really cooperating.

on the ic-905 — i saw one at hamvention and yeah the build quality looked impressive but the price point is just not something i can justify. if you're into weak signal vhf and up work i imagine its incredible though. the guys doing EME and stuff are pretty excited about it from what ive read.

omg wait 10m was open?? i had my radio on 40m all day troubleshooting an antenna issue and totally missed it. thats always how it goes lol. ill make sure to check it today. i only got my general like 4 months ago so i havent really experienced a good 10m opening yet, most of what ive read says it used to be pretty dead. super excited to try it out finally.