The AM Forum

The sunspots are popping up faster than predicted on this cycle (25), so it's time to get your 10M AM gear out of the back of the garage and get an antenna up.
Just get on 29.000 and call CQ. Of course weekends are the best bet.

Actually at this time of the year, sunspots are unimportant. Sporadic E runs rampant from roughly May through August each year  and doesn't care what the sun is doing.

Right now on 10 meters, single and multi hop Sporadic E contacts are very active.
however, many of the contacts are on digital and CW. See maps below taken at 5 PM EDT today.
Top picture includes digital, CW, and phone; bottom picture just phone.

A better place for sun spot frequency tickling is 15 meters and even 20 meters. MUF today is around 21 MHz.

Like 6 meters, which is also open today with single and multi hop Sporadic E, 10 meters has a lot of digital activity. I don't except that to change (except for phone contests) as we move into the winter months and a rising MUF.

The west coast has had some 6 and 10 meter openings.. Not much double hop.  The openings correspond to the Es cloud locations and numbers on DX MAPS very closely.  Fun stuff

The 6 meter Sporadic E stuff is already starting to wane. We'll still probably get some good openings through September but not with the intensity and duration of a mid summer opening.

Looks like 10 meters is starting to show the same signs but, on the plus side, trans-equatorial openings are becoming more common.