so ive had my technician for about a year and a half now and mostly been doing 2m/70cm stuff, some local repeaters, helped out at a couple of ARES nets. but ive been really curious about HF and everyone keeps telling me to just go get my general already. my question is how hard is the pool actually compared to the tech exam? i remember the tech exam being not that bad but i also studied for like 3 weeks straight using the hamstudy website and the gordon west book.

the main things im nervous about are the electrical stuff and the propagation questions because i feel like i barely understood that on the tech test and i assume general goes deeper into it. also whats the deal with HF privileges once you get it, like what bands can you actually use and what cant you use because i keep getting confused reading the band plan. is 40m a good starting point for HF? everyone seems to mention 40m for new HF operators.

anyway just looking for some general advice i guess, sorry if this is a vague question

honestly the general exam isnt that much harder than tech, at least thats how i felt when i upgraded a few years back. the electrical theory goes a little deeper but if you just grind hamstudy.org for a couple weeks youll be fine. they literally show you the actual questions from the pool so its not like youre guessing what to study. i think i spent maybe 2 weeks on it, maybe 20-30 minutes a day and passed no problem.

for HF privileges once youre general you get access to most of the good stuff. you get chunks of 40m, 20m, 15m, 10m and some others. the only things really held back are certain phone segments that are extra class only. 20m is probably the most popular for general class ops to start with because propagation is pretty forgiving but yeah 40m is great too especially in the evenings when it really opens up. i started on 40m and just listened for like two weeks before ever transmitting which helped a ton.

dont overthink the propagation questions on the exam, they mostly just want you to know basic stuff like what ionospheric layers do what and when certain bands are good. its not as deep as it sounds on paper.

im kind of in the same boat as you actually, been a tech for about 8 months and keep going back and forth on whether to bother. curious what people say here. one thing i did hear is that the general pool has more math type questions, like calculating stuff with ohms law and maybe some antenna stuff? not sure if thats true or just something someone told me to scare me lol