I purchased this text about 1 month ago with high hopes. I am not impressed. After going over both AM exams and the Construction PM exam, I am either
1. An idiot who is taking too long to complete most of these problems.
or
2. The text was poorly written by someone (or people) who did not read the NCEES syllabus and have no concept of what an average 6 minute problem looks like.
So the worry is I may have wasted the equaivalent of 2 to 3 days and money on this text. In short most problems take too long, some are unrelated to the exam (i.e. traffic studies for the AM?), others require obscure equations (i.e. you would probably need the Green Book, etc..., and I'm not a transpo person, to solve.)
There are some good problems in here for sure, but too many take too long. They sort of remind me of the 6 - minute solutions texts and the CERM Practice Problems by Lindeburg. The main difference being those problems are written clearly overall. Anyway, here is what I found so far.
ERRATA
Page 195, Problem 36. Should be 243% increase. (not 143%). Unless I'm mistaken.
Page 37, Problem 120. A lousy question - finding the general relationship for critical velocity/depth for a triangular section. I would like to see if most Civil Hydraulic Professors can solve this inside of 6 minutes? I post this as an Errata because it should be left out of the question set. Maybe a good question for the PM exam, but not AM. Again, 6 minutes.
Page 212, Problem 123. I get V = 6.18 ft/sec. I think Goswami's answer (7.15) works too. Might be a bad coincidence of two intersecting solutions.
Page 40, Problem 126. Did the Author take time to read the NCEES Breadth syllabus for Transportation? Nowhere do I see traffic counts, studies, of any kind. Therefore, this should be removed from the AM and placed in the Transpo PM problem set.
Page 42, Problem 132. See previous statement. Wasted ink.
Page 46, Problem 140. Poorly written. Not clear what we are asked to find: net cost of what? Crashing Schedule option vs. Normal Schedulle?
Again, I have only gone through the AM (#1 and #2) and Construction PM Exams so those venturing further will no doubt uncover more frustration.
thanks,
Jason
1. An idiot who is taking too long to complete most of these problems.
or
2. The text was poorly written by someone (or people) who did not read the NCEES syllabus and have no concept of what an average 6 minute problem looks like.
So the worry is I may have wasted the equaivalent of 2 to 3 days and money on this text. In short most problems take too long, some are unrelated to the exam (i.e. traffic studies for the AM?), others require obscure equations (i.e. you would probably need the Green Book, etc..., and I'm not a transpo person, to solve.)
There are some good problems in here for sure, but too many take too long. They sort of remind me of the 6 - minute solutions texts and the CERM Practice Problems by Lindeburg. The main difference being those problems are written clearly overall. Anyway, here is what I found so far.
ERRATA
Page 195, Problem 36. Should be 243% increase. (not 143%). Unless I'm mistaken.
Page 37, Problem 120. A lousy question - finding the general relationship for critical velocity/depth for a triangular section. I would like to see if most Civil Hydraulic Professors can solve this inside of 6 minutes? I post this as an Errata because it should be left out of the question set. Maybe a good question for the PM exam, but not AM. Again, 6 minutes.
Page 212, Problem 123. I get V = 6.18 ft/sec. I think Goswami's answer (7.15) works too. Might be a bad coincidence of two intersecting solutions.
Page 40, Problem 126. Did the Author take time to read the NCEES Breadth syllabus for Transportation? Nowhere do I see traffic counts, studies, of any kind. Therefore, this should be removed from the AM and placed in the Transpo PM problem set.
Page 42, Problem 132. See previous statement. Wasted ink.
Page 46, Problem 140. Poorly written. Not clear what we are asked to find: net cost of what? Crashing Schedule option vs. Normal Schedulle?
Again, I have only gone through the AM (#1 and #2) and Construction PM Exams so those venturing further will no doubt uncover more frustration.
thanks,
Jason