Amateur Radio Study guide -FREE!

[prerunner1982]

All (most) of the Amateur Radio forums seem to refer people to published books such as the ARRL Study Guide, Technician Class by Gordon West, or even Ham Radio for Dummies. Paperback copies ranging form $20-$25.

I recently found a Free Technician and General class study guide that I thought I would pass on to any XJTalk.com members that may be interested in obtaining their Amateur Radio license.

You have to pass the Technician class test before you can take the General (and the General to take the Extra) so I would start with the Technician class study guide. After reading it and taking (and passing) some online practice tests, if you are feeling smart you can try studying for the General and see how you do on the practice test. You can take all the actual test in one sitting so it certainly wouldn't hurt to study the General and try it when you take the real test, you may just pass it. But make sure you can pass the Tech first.

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B4LZFrv7Rr2YNUVKVHZRTlcxRVU/edit?pli=1 <--- Technician

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B4LZFrv7Rr2YeFd1aFdDRW5FUGM/edit?pli=1 <--- General

[XJ Wheeler]

Awesome. Thanks for sharing those, Jon. Been wanting to study up on this.

[prerunner1982]

Well.... looks like I have set a date to test, August 3rd. Gonna shoot for the General class.... we shall see.

[XJ Wheeler]

I'm not seeing anything on the links, it just goes to a blank page for me.

[prerunner1982]

hmmm works fine for me. Are you using you phone or PC? If using you phone, it opens a PDF doc which your phone may not support.

Here is the website the study guides came from: http://www.kb6nu.com/tech-manual/

[XJ Wheeler]

hmmm works fine for me. Are you using you phone or PC? If using you phone, it opens a PDF doc which your phone may not support.

Here is the website the study guides came from: http://www.kb6nu.com/tech-manual/

Thanks, bud. I am on a phone, i'll see if i can get them to work for me from there.

[bluedragon436]

Thanks for those great links Jon... Got em downloaded and going to study while I'm in the sandbox... I see you have a call sign in your signature... did you get the General like you were shooting for or Technical???

[BlueXJ]

Excuse my ignorance but what advantage is the General over the Technician license?
What the different radio freq s can each license use and do I need various radios for each type license?

[Mudderoy]

Excuse my ignorance but what advantage is the General over the Technician license?
What the different radio freq s can each license use and do I need various radios for each type license?

The biggest difference is one you can talk on VHF UHF and higher frequencies, the other you can talk on those plus HF. HF is generally considered to be the World wide frequencies.

You can have a radio for each, HF, VHF, UHF, etc... or you can have one radio for all of them. I have one radio for all of them. Actually I have the same radio in the house and the Jeep.

That's the easy simple answer. Amateur radio is so vast it would be difficult to have one radio that did everything, but I have a radio that would be generally accepted as a radio that went anywhere MOST HAMs go.

[prerunner1982]

Below is the Amateur Radio band plan showing what License has access to what frequencies and what type of communications within each frequency.

For voice operation the Tech license can operate in the 6m, 2m, 1.25m, 70cm, 33cm, 23cm, and on up into the Ghz.

A General licensed operator gets all that plus voice operations in the 10m, 12m, 15m, 17m, 20m, 40m, 80m, and 160m.

More or less Tech is for local communications while General allows World wide communications.

http://www.callsignsoftware.com/images/BANDPLAN.jpg

[prerunner1982]

I see you have a call sign in your signature... did you get the General like you were shooting for or Technical???

I passed the General as well. Missed 5.. which is more than I had been missing on the practice test and more than I wanted to miss, but was still passing.

[bluedragon436]

I'll be just fine if I miss a few.. so long as I pass.. If I somehow don't pass, then I'll just study up a bit more and take it again...

[xj-jake]

You guys are making it so we don't have a reason not to get the license.

[prerunner1982]

That's the idea.