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I've always wondered how exam results can be transferred between states without being a PE due to lack of experience. In CA, no one can take the exam prior to having the necessary experience and referrals, whereas in Nevada, you can take the exam before you've gained the experience, even right...

There's never a quick and dirty, plug-and-chug way to solve these problems because they can vary. I think you just need to understand that soil has a different densities in situ versus in transit versus in place. If possible, you always want to solve for the dry unit weight and density at each...

Yeah, it went up a lot! But the renewal fee went down $10. That must have been part of the fee negotiation talks. :)

Usually a question like this includes a borrow scenario where you're excavating, hauling, and placing material from one site to another while tracking the material's compaction and moisture content.

Most engineers don't travel as much these days other than for construction jobs or for specialized work. For general civil engineering work, it's not common for design engineers to travel frequently unless the client and/or project required some on-site presence. Apart from construction...

I think the rest of us find it fascinating that we're flogging this horse of a question to no end. It's time to call it a day on this one. The method of calculating the 85th percentile is really a no-brainer and doesn't merit an academic exercise.

The test is 2.5 hours, but the time slot takes into account setup and closeout time so that the next examinee can sit at the computer at their designated time. Test booklets would be necessary since they require all handwork to be done in them. Don't stress out. This solution has exceeded my...

My favorite line from Maybenexttime's letter is "filling my gas tank with gas to drive to and from the exam site"... I didn't know you can fill your gas tank with another liquid! :) It's always a good practice to make sure someone else proofreads a letter, especially to an Executive Officer of...

If the exam were to be rescheduled in June, it would mean they would have to evaluate all of the exams in about 2 or 3 weeks. This would give them time to provide new PE licenses to those who only needed surveying to pass, as well as a 3-month lead time for examinees who may not pass (in June)...

I completely sympathize with everyone affected by this fiasco. It's an unprecendented circumstance that truly does not have proper reconciliation for everyone. What will we deemed as fair by the Board will certainly not be a shared feeling by most of the examinees, and vice versa. Here's what...

I was also thinking about the question and my previous method was incorrect. I agree with ptatohed that the offset to the left is with respect to the direction of the curve and would increase the radius to 1806 feet. The left/right perspective is similar to hydraulic modeling where the left...

Also, the arc length of the original curve is 362 feet, so a shift of 12 feet of the PT (i.e. 3% of the length), regardless of direction, would not yield nearly a 400-foot difference in the radius (30% difference less than the original) as your answer is showing.

The only info we have is: "The forward tangent is to be shifted parallel to itself and 12' to the left." The shift can only be assumed a slide 12 feet to the left because no other directional information is provided. If it's a right angle offset, then we would only need to add or subract this...

My approach is like ptatohed, but my formula's are different: Chord length of original curve (horizontal line connecting PC and PT) = 2 x 1430 x sin(14.5/2) = 360.92 feet Since the PT is shifted horizontally to the left by 12 feet and PC is the same point, the new chord length is 360.92 - 12 =...

Bravo mrt406! The process of solving this question is about calculation, not just by adding some numbers then determining which bin the next highest number falls into. Another example of an acceptable calculated value is the number of people per household: 2.59. Common sense tells you that...

Please cite your reference in your statement above. I believe you're fabricating the definition of the 85th percentile in this example where the sample set of 100 values. Regardless of the number of values in a sample set, percentiles and actual values are not the same.

I clearly see something isn't right.

C'mon...Really? Are you going to die on the sword for this one? If you had to do this calculation for a client ... say in Florida ...and you were required to put your stamp on it, would you really stray from the standard? I didn't think so.

Now you're just being contrary. Your bin theory does not comply to a normal distribution graph; it would a stepped (layer cake) graph. If you visualize the data as a bell-curve graph, then you have to assign a single value within each bin, like a trend line. You would then use this line to...

This is incorrect. If the vehicle counts were doubled (i.e. total of 200 cars in the sample set), you would still think the 85 percentile speed is 45 mph because of your "bin" theory. This is why the vehicle count versus percentile must be mutually exclusive. Assuming normal/linear...