"Cycle 24's peak is past and will fall into the ranks of the lower
Sunspot Cycles 10, 12, 13, 14, and 16. NASA's article pointed out
Cycle 24 being the smallest since Cycle 14 in 1906. It will probably
mirror Cycle 12 or 13 finishing with a smoothed sunspot number in
the high 70s low 80s plus or minus. A few additional points make
this cycle unique in addition to the second peak being higher than
the first: In past strong sunspot cycles (21, 22, and 23) we have
had what I would call the 'top 3' being 3 outstanding years of high
solar activity (the year prior to the peak, the year of the peak,
and the year after where Solar flux values have averaged between 150
and 225).
"Tying this observation to Cycle 23 (a lower but normal cycle in
2000, 2001, and 2002) during these peak years propagation on 10, 12,
and 15 meters was outstanding almost ALL the time. Cycle 24 has
bestowed just a little over one year of this type of propagation -
late 2013 to present. Graphically seen from the Solar activity
report from this Web link:
"
http://www.solen.info/solar/images/comparison_recent_cycles.png "Things become more interesting with the fact Cycle 24 will
obviously finish with a smoothed sunspot number of less than 100.
"This is the first time this has occurred since Cycle 16 finished in
1933 (over 80 years ago!).
"Link with the corresponding data:
"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_solar_cycles.png "Graphically, Cycle 24 will fit into the BIG picture as follows,
accurately done by K9LA:
"
http://k9la.us/A_Look_at_All_Twenty_Three_Solar_Cycles.pdf "Connecting the dots from the graphs, historically there have been
decades of high and low solar activity spanning several sunspot
cycles. As one source has pointed out, got most of our radio amateur
lifetimes we have experienced some of the highest solar activity
periods in history, 1950 to 2009. The Graph from NASA of the current
trend pretty well sums up the overall direction:
"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_cycle_24#mediaviewer/File:Hathaway_Cycle_24_Prediction.png "Summarizing:
"Cycle 24 will be a low cycle very likely to be followed by several
other low or even lower cycles - supported by the current and
historical data. Make the most of the current band conditions and
upcoming DXpeditions - it certainly looks as if we are heading
toward a 'Propagation Winter.'"
There's always the summer Sporadic E season where propagation can be good to great, although sporadic.
