so ive been a general for about two years now and i keep going back and forth on whether to bother with the extra. like i know you get the full privileges on HF which is the main thing, those little slices at the bottom of 20m and 40m where all the DX stations seem to hang out. but the theory stuff in the exam looks pretty intense. i was looking at some practice questions last night and some of the filter design stuff and the advanced propagation questions just... i dont even know where to start honestly.

i guess what im asking is did anyone here feel like they actually learned useful stuff studying for it or is it mostly just memorizing formulas you'll never use again. also how long did it realistically take you to feel ready. i work full time so i cant exactly sit down and study for 8 hours a day

honest answer? about half of it you'll actually use and the other half is just hoops. but here's the thing, the hoops are worth jumping through because some of that theory does stick and you start understanding WHY your antenna is doing what its doing or why a certain filter configuration causes problems. i did mine over about 3 months of casual studying, maybe 45 minutes a night a few times a week. ham study dot com and just grinding practice exams until i was consistently hitting 85 percent or better. the actual exam felt easier than the practice ones somehow.

the extra band privileges are real and you will notice it on 40m especially during a pileup. worth doing in my opinion, just dont stress about fully understanding every formula. get the concept down and the math will follow eventually or it wont and youll still pass.

i just passed mine like six weeks ago so this is fresh. the oscillator stability questions and the stuff about op-amp circuits was the part that got me, had to watch a bunch of youtube videos to even get close to understanding it. but yeah once i actually had the ticket and jumped down into the extra portion on 17m during a contest weekend it immediately felt worth it. stations i could never work before just sitting right there.