April PE - What did you think?

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It's always interesting when I see comments that the morning or afternoon session was easier or harder than the other for the Power exam. My understanding is that problems are fairly evenly distributed through both sessions for Electrical, unlike some of the other exams which have a "breadth" session in the morning and a "depth" session in the afternoon. That was my experience for the most part when I took it last fall, I didn't find either session to be particularly easier than the other and thought topics were spread out pretty evenly between the two.

Not saying you guys are wrong, just interesting how different perceptions can be.

 
It's always interesting when I see comments that the morning or afternoon session was easier or harder than the other for the Power exam. My understanding is that problems are fairly evenly distributed through both sessions for Electrical, unlike some of the other exams which have a "breadth" session in the morning and a "depth" session in the afternoon. That was my experience for the most part when I took it last fall, I didn't find either session to be particularly easier than the other and thought topics were spread out pretty evenly between the two.

Not saying you guys are wrong, just interesting how different perceptions can be.
I think both are equally hard but because our mind was prep and ready for battle in the morning and as the battle keep grind into the PM session, our mind are working less efficient than the morning (not this cycle test, I took mine last year)

 
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Yeah I would agree with that. I thought they were pretty much equal in difficulty, but my mind just gave out around question 60 and it was a struggle mentally to finish the test.

 
Overall I though it was a fair exam, though I must say I ended up guessing in about 30 questions.

The breath of the exam is quite large :reading: and it's difficult to cover all the topics. Also, there were some question that weren't properly or completely worded, which caused some confusion. I remember a problem that would normally take two steps to solve, however the question wasn't specific as to where on the given system they were asking for the particular condition. So I had to solve it for all possible locations :brickwall: (remember 2 steps per location) then check the solutions to see if one of my answers was there.

The morning and afternoon were about the same difficulty. For me the afternoon was better. I got a good feel of the exam by then.

 
I felt the morning and afternoon were equal difficulty. I left both sessions feeling they were both challenging. I know I didn't bomb either session, but I know I didn't ace them either. I'm guessing I would score right around the 70% range. Either slightly above or slightly below...

 
During the morning and afternoon sections I ended up with the same amount of unanswered questions. Had to guess around 20 of them total, most of the time I was left with 2 options options instead of 4, hopefully I get 50% of the guessed one right.

I do not remember seeing the error on the KVA/KW questions, if they throw it out, do you get the points if you got it correctly?

 
Welcome and best of luck.
Thanks! Same to you.
Thanks. But I passed last time around.
Oops. I thought everyone who passed had 'PE' in their username. Looked that way in some other threads I was reading.
Depending..not everyone like to boast their PE LOL
I don't think it's because we're boasting about passing the PE (at least I'm not and either way passing is something to be proud of). EB-wise it makes sense to have PE on your user name so new members seeking advice can easily see if you've taken and passed the exam. It's an easy way to verify that you've been there/done that and are giving information based on experience.
Off topic, but has anyone else had trouble changing their display name? After the results of the October exam, I've tried adding PE to the end of my current display name, but it always tells me the name is currently taken. If I search the member list, I don't see it listed. Oh well, maybe I'm better at test taking than I am at forum profile navigation :)

 
Welcome and best of luck.
Thanks! Same to you.
Thanks. But I passed last time around.
Oops. I thought everyone who passed had 'PE' in their username. Looked that way in some other threads I was reading.
Depending..not everyone like to boast their PE LOL
I don't think it's because we're boasting about passing the PE (at least I'm not and either way passing is something to be proud of). EB-wise it makes sense to have PE on your user name so new members seeking advice can easily see if you've taken and passed the exam. It's an easy way to verify that you've been there/done that and are giving information based on experience.
Off topic, but has anyone else had trouble changing their display name? After the results of the October exam, I've tried adding PE to the end of my current display name, but it always tells me the name is currently taken. If I search the member list, I don't see it listed. Oh well, maybe I'm better at test taking than I am at forum profile navigation :)
Did a test. Had the same problem. Looks like Ship Wreck has the right idea.

 
It's always interesting when I see comments that the morning or afternoon session was easier or harder than the other for the Power exam. My understanding is that problems are fairly evenly distributed through both sessions for Electrical, unlike some of the other exams which have a "breadth" session in the morning and a "depth" session in the afternoon. That was my experience for the most part when I took it last fall, I didn't find either session to be particularly easier than the other and thought topics were spread out pretty evenly between the two.

Not saying you guys are wrong, just interesting how different perceptions can be.
I think both are equally hard but because our mind was prep and ready for battle in the morning and as the battle keep grind into the PM session, our mind are working less efficient than the morning (not this cycle test, I took mine last year)


When I took the PE, my strategy was to read every question and answer every question that required no calculations first (conceptual questions/'gimmie' questions). Then I went through and answered everything that required calculation but I knew how to do it real quick and didn't need to look anything up (or possibly had to look up an equation, but knew I had that tabbed). Then I knew how much time per question I would have to do any research on the more difficult questions. In the morning on mine, I knocked out like 15-20 questions with minimal calculation. In the afternoon there were like 6 that I was able to knock out. One of my friends had the same thing in the morning where he finished two hours early. So he pulled out his practice materials and started working problems out of that (all writing in the exam booklet) to prep for the afternoon.

 
Hi,

is there any possibilities that the passing score could be 40-50/80 or it is always above 56/80.

Hoping all of you will pass.

 
Hi,

is there any possibilities that the passing score could be 40-50/80 or it is always above 56/80.

Hoping all of you will pass.
639eb9257f81533d9a202172bb0460038acbeddd1b4e85032faebef5b0c18c10.jpg


 
It's always interesting when I see comments that the morning or afternoon session was easier or harder than the other for the Power exam. My understanding is that problems are fairly evenly distributed through both sessions for Electrical, unlike some of the other exams which have a "breadth" session in the morning and a "depth" session in the afternoon. That was my experience for the most part when I took it last fall, I didn't find either session to be particularly easier than the other and thought topics were spread out pretty evenly between the two.

Not saying you guys are wrong, just interesting how different perceptions can be.
I think both are equally hard but because our mind was prep and ready for battle in the morning and as the battle keep grind into the PM session, our mind are working less efficient than the morning (not this cycle test, I took mine last year)


When I took the PE, my strategy was to read every question and answer every question that required no calculations first (conceptual questions/'gimmie' questions). Then I went through and answered everything that required calculation but I knew how to do it real quick and didn't need to look anything up (or possibly had to look up an equation, but knew I had that tabbed). Then I knew how much time per question I would have to do any research on the more difficult questions. In the morning on mine, I knocked out like 15-20 questions with minimal calculation. In the afternoon there were like 6 that I was able to knock out. One of my friends had the same thing in the morning where he finished two hours early. So he pulled out his practice materials and started working problems out of that (all writing in the exam booklet) to prep for the afternoon.
I used a similiar strategy in April 2014. Worked like a charm. Picked it up from the Spinup book.

 
I can't speak for the April exam since I thankfully passed the October exam, but, I thought the morning session for Oct '14 was much more difficult than the afternoon. I used every minute of the morning session just to complete the 40 questions. I had approximately 45 minutes to check my answers in the afternoon. I think it has more to do with ones specific area of expertise and luck of the draw in when those questions are asked.

 

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