so ive been noticing 10m and 12m have been doing some really strange things the past couple weeks. some days i can work europe no problem from here in the midwest, other days i cant even hear anything past a few hundred miles. checked the solar flux index and its been bouncing around pretty wildly, like up in the 180s one day then dropping back down below 150 a few days later. not sure if thats normal for where we are in the cycle or if somethings else going on.

had a brief opening to JA land yesterday morning around 0900 local which was a surprise, worked a couple stations but it closed up fast. 17m has been my go-to when 10 falls apart but even thats been inconsistent. anyone else seeing this or am i just having bad luck with timing

yeah the flux has been all over the place, you're not imagining it. we're still climbing toward the solar max and these fluctuations are pretty normal honestly. the geomagnetic stuff is what really kills it for me - even when flux is decent a kp index spike will wipe out the higher bands for a day or two. i keep spaceweather.com open basically all the time now, that and the DX maps to see where the spots are clustering before i even turn the radio on.

that JA opening you mentioned, those tend to be short-lived gray line things in the morning especially on 10 and 12. if you werent already watching for it thats actually pretty good you caught it at all. i missed one last week completely because i was on 20 and didnt even think to check up higher.

im pretty new to HF, only been at it about 8 months, but i've been using the pskreporter site to kind of gauge whats happening before i get on. not sure im reading it all correctly tbh. whats a good solar flux number to aim for if i want to try 10m? ive heard the band is way better than it used to be but i feel like every time i tune around up there its pretty quiet from my end