so ive been a Tech for about two years now and mostly just doing VHF/UHF stuff on my local repeaters and some APRS. lately ive been really curious about HF and all the guys at my club keep telling me to just go get my General already. i started looking at the question pool and honestly some of it looks pretty intimidating, especially the electrical stuff and the propagation questions. i dont have an engineering background or anything, im just a regular guy who got into this hobby during the pandemic.

i guess my question is how long did it take you guys to feel ready for the General exam and is there a good way to study for it or do i just need to memorize the whole question pool? also is there anything specific about the HF privileges that i should know before i even bother, like is it worth the hassle for what you get access to. sorry if this is a vague question im just not sure what i dont know yet if that makes sense

honestly dont overthink it. i was in the same boat, Tech for like three years just sitting on 2m and 70cm and then finally buckled down for General. the question pool is like 450 questions or something and only 35 show up on the test. i used HamStudy.org basically every day for maybe three weeks, just drilling questions on my phone during lunch breaks. the electrical theory stuff looks scary at first but once you see the same questions a few times it clicks. i didnt really understand all of it deeply but i understood enough to pass and honestly the HF experience itself teaches you the rest way faster than studying ever could.

as for whether its worth it — man 40 meters alone on a weekend evening is worth every bit of effort. you can be talking to guys in europe or south america just with a wire in a tree. its a completely different world from repeater stuff. just go do it, you wont regret it

I took mine last spring after putting it off forever and I'll be real with you, the hardest part for me was the band plan stuff and remembering which frequencies Generals can actually use vs what's still Extra only. there's a few questions on there about operating privileges that tripped me up during practice. the math questions look scary but theres usually only a couple and if you learn ohms law and a few basic formulas you can usually figure it out even if you never memorized the answer.

one thing nobody told me beforehand — even after you pass you still need to wait for your license to show up in the FCC ULS database before you can actually operate on HF. took mine like 4 days. i was just sitting there staring at my radio lol