# PE exam gotcha!



## Matt-NM (Mar 10, 2008)

To anybody that has taken the PE exam in the past:

What were the main things that you determined after taking the exam, or during the exam for that matter, that you would have given anything to have known during the preparation process? A "freebie" if you will.

I guess I am thinking of things like...

1. Studied morning section to much/not enough.

2. Ignored subjects/problems I was almost guaranteed would not show

up.

3. Not enough book tabs/ to many book tabs.

4. Studied problems that were to difficult and not representative of actual exam.

These are just a few examples I thought of. I always remember taking tests in school and within a few minutes scolding myself for having ignored something that I shouldn't have.

Thanks for all the help. !


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## frazil (Mar 10, 2008)

so you're willing to give _anything _to find out?


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## maryannette (Mar 10, 2008)

I wish I had reviewed the topics that I studied a few months before the exam. It would have been fresher.


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## cocoloco (Mar 10, 2008)

Be careful with the 'most nearly' answers. Your answer should come pretty close to any of the given answers. For example, if your calculated Mass flow rate comes in 10 gallons from the nearest answer, DO NOT fill in that bubble until you double check your work.


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## snickerd3 (Mar 10, 2008)

I don't know if I have any wish I would have knowns, but I do know there are plenty I'm glad I paid attention too.

In the problem statement I underlined what units they wanted the answer in and if it was a most nearly, best etc...

I'm glad I studied the super hard much longer problems. They may not have been representative of the test, but it made me study and truely understand the topic so when I saw a shorter problem on the test I was more comfortable solving it, cuz I had been solving way more difficult ones during all those months of studying.

Units, units, units. I made sure I had a great unit conversion table/page with me, as several problems were really just unit conversions.


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## MarcG (Mar 10, 2008)

Matt-NM said:


> I guess I am thinking of things like...
> 1. Studied morning section to much/not enough.
> 
> 2. Ignored subjects/problems I was almost guaranteed would not show
> ...


1: I think I studied too much on the morning section. I was able to solve a majority of the problems.

2: This wasn't a problem in the morning, as I think I over studied, but in the afternoon this became a problem. Make sure you atleast know the concept behind the problems you think won't be on the test...so you can figure it out if you have time left. Also, if there are multiple code allowed variations on a solution...make sure you know the difference between them and if they will impact the way you normally do the problem.

3: I had way to many tabs, I didn't use them, but the tabbing process allowed me to learn what was in the book and what wasn't.

4: Morning, yes...afternoon, no.

hope this helps :beerchug:


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## KEG (Mar 10, 2008)

Know your reference material. Whatever it takes, tabs, reading, by memory. Be able to read the question, understand what they are asking for and if you don't automatically know how to solve the problem, you should automatically know which book to reach for to quickly help you find the solution. I thought I knew my reference material in October '07 (1st try) but I quickly found out otherwise. I had plenty of reference material, but for certain questions, I had no clue which was the best book to begin my search in.

Also, know how to use all the functions on your calculator, primary and backup. I had a different calculator for my backup (not a good idea) and when my original's batteries died, I had to take time to figure out how to do complex numbers on the backup. This is not something you want to stress out about during the exam, its stressful enough as it is.


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## Techie_Junkie_PE_LEED_AP (Mar 11, 2008)

I tabbed just right and had a ton of reference that I knew very well. If I screwed that up, that's is what I'd be putting here as "I wish I only..."


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## Matt-NM (Mar 11, 2008)

Thanks for all the replies. Very valuable information to say the least. I wish I could somehow magically harness all of the good things people have done in the past. I will try my best.

What % of questions would you say you were able to answer on the exam using nothing but MERM (or CERM, or the others)? I have heard comments from "I used nothing but MERM" to "MERM was useless for the afternoon." I'm hoping the majority of the questions can be solved using MERM.


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## Sschell (Mar 12, 2008)

Mechanical eh...

1. DON"T BRING TOO MANY REFERENCES!!!! this is not the civil exam!

My recommendation would be MERM and 2 to 3 trusted references (depending on which afternoon sect you are taking). MERM itself is probably good enough. If you feel you absolutely need more books than that... bring something with wheels to carry them in (I have whined more than once about the 1/2 mile treck from parking to test laiden whit 60 lbs of books that I never opened during the test.

2. To go along with item 1: take the time to know your references VERY well (know where to find stuff quickly)

3. STUDY STUDY STUDY... I highly recommend taking the time to do ALL the problems in MERM, and both NCEES and "the other board" practice tests.


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## Matt-NM (Mar 12, 2008)

sschell_pe

I will be taking the machine design depth. I actually considered the thermo/fluids depth for about a day this week and then wised up. I am hoping to be able to use MERM for the vast majority of the problems. I was actually thinking of something last night, in my sleep I think. (How sad is that. I'm to the point where all this stuff is racing through my head at night and it's keeping me from sleeping!).

Since the exam problems have an average of 6 minutes each, there is no way that NCEES can be making them that difficult. I know that the exam is very difficult of course, otherwise everybody would pass the first time. What I am trying to get at is that I am beginning to agree that exam success will probably depend on understanding the concepts, as opposed to hoping that identical or very similar practice problems appear in large numbers. I hope I am right with this, since I will probably tailor my last month of study around it. I will not sweat a difficult solution to one of the "six-minute soultion" problems, as long as I know where the concepts were obtained. There are just so many different questions that could be asked. I really can see indexing hundreds and hundreds of solved problems and then being able to apply them to an exact question on the exam in a reasonable amount of time. Of course template problems for general types such as using the Bernoulli equation for energy conservation will be useful, since they are likely to be asked more than once.

Anybody have any comments on the whole "Know The Concepts" question, whether you have taken the exam before or not?

Thanks. Gettin down to crunch time!


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## Sschell (Mar 12, 2008)

I think the whole idea is to "know the concepts"... that is the point of the test.

It is at least as important to know your reference materials... My copy of MERM looks like it went through the spin cycle a couple of times.

The whole point of working through hundreds of practice problems is becoming familiar and comfortable with solving *simplified* engineering problems, and again (sorry if I sound like a broken record) getting to know your reference books.


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## ufcfan (Mar 12, 2008)

^^ Very true the point of "Know the concepts". When studying I focused too much on certain type of problems and then in the exam i had to work with different details, like for example exercises of turbines with gas instead of vapor. The point is that it's better to review the concepts first and then then the practice problems. Hope this helps.


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## benbo (Mar 12, 2008)

I took electrical but it probably is true for most exams. I agree with knowing the concepts being the most important thing (and for some exams knowing the references, although I didn't use a huge number of references.)

The problem comes with how you figure out whether you actually know and understand the concepts or not. That is why you have to work problems. I'm not talking huge drawn out problems, but I need to work enough problems to know that I really do understand the concepts. You may not have to work it all the way to the end, but that helps too with eliminating stupid mistakes.

Some people are really good at reading and absorbing things and have a really good grasp on their level of knowlege just from that. If you are like that, more power to you. I am not. I may think I know how to do something, but I am never sure until I try a problem or two.

I know a few people from school and on this exam who studied it like a history text, right down to underlining things with highliter. But they never put it in practice and they failed first time out. After working problems, they passed.

Why do most people choose to go into liberal arts or something that is not technical? Because they don't like working problems. I read it somewhere here on EB.com - Engineering is about numbers. Everything else is opinion.


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## rudy (Mar 12, 2008)

The best thing I did was only concentrating on the NCEES topics and making notes for them. Check out the thread in the ChemE forum:

http://engineerboards.com/index.php?showtopic=5458

To me, the notes in that thread are what it means to "know the concepts" (knowing the topics: including theory and problems) and "studying smart" (studying by focusing only on the NCEES topics and using whatever references necessary to study those topics). Maybe something similar will be helpful for you.

I thought that all problems took 6 minutes and I would not be able to review the exam first. After experiencing the test a couple of times, I realized that some problems take less than 6 minutes to solve. The best thing I did was review the all the problems first and mark them with E for easy, M for medium, H for hard. Then, I attacked each problem in that order. I was even left with time to spare.


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## NCcarguy (Mar 13, 2008)

After taking the Civil PE 4 times before I passed!!! I think I learned a little each time about how to be successful at it and when I finally did pass, I was able to look back at what I think really made the difference. Here's what I suggest

TAKE YOUR TIME on each question! Don't panic.....be very thourough in understanding what they are asking for an answer.

Whenever you have a "Look-up" type question, be VERY careful to notice ANYTHING that might be a qualifier to the obvious answer. The best example is if you have something you're looking up in a chart, make sure the small print below the chart doesn't add or subtract anything from the answer.

My guess is that 90-95% pass or fail within 3-4 questions either way.....that being said, you can't afford to give away an easy one...so just be very sure you carefully answer each question. I failed 3 times by one or two questions, and I could usually leave the exam, and look up one or 2 that I easily should have gotten correct, but overlooked something....

remember.....it's really more a test that determines if you are capable of following engineering principles...not how smart you are at it. Most of the questions are much easier than most people will admit, and if you had a week to take the test, you could probably make a 100%, but the 6 minute limit is for a reason....can you carefully look up something, understand it, and do the necessary simple calcs to get to the correct answer?


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## C-Dog (Mar 13, 2008)

I did not study one subject at all (Thermo was only 5% of the exam) because I knew I would not get it down by exam time, but that freeed me up to really study stuff I was somewhat good at.


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## csb (Mar 13, 2008)

I detemined after failing the first time I wish I would have answered three more problems correctly...That's what I wish I would have done differently.

Here's hoping in 28 days I do just that!


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## Sschell (Mar 13, 2008)

NCcarguy said:


> it's really more a test that determines if you are capable of following engineering principles...not how smart you are at it.


Not really the case in Mechanical (thats why we don't bring code books to the test)...

I think the test is really about knowing how to approach a problem (and knowing your refe... ok I'll shut up)


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## NCcarguy (Mar 13, 2008)

sschell_PE said:


> Not really the case in Mechanical (thats why we don't bring code books to the test)...
> I think the test is really about knowing how to approach a problem (and knowing your refe... ok I'll shut up)



actually...I think you're making the same point. It's not a test to see how great an engineer you are. If that were the case, you would certainly need the code books. They're testing you on how well you can take a problem, look at the reference material you have, and apply formula's that are in those books to a solution.

I think I was thinking the same as you.


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## rudy (Mar 16, 2008)

Here's a thread from a couple of years ago that maybe helpful. It's titled "Exam Gotcha's":

http://engineerboards.com/index.php?showtopic=961


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## FINK_RB_PE (Mar 17, 2008)

The best advice is to watch your clock, know that at 10:00 I should be through x number of problems so that at 10:00 you know where you stand, I can't telll you how many gasps I heard when they announced 15 minutes. The other little tid-bit is to keep track of the amount of questions you know for certain are correct. When I left I was certian I had over 70% of the test correct so the guessing or ones that I was fairly sure about would only help that amount and that really helps with peace of mind, because if you think the stress is getting high now just wait until the first states start to report, you will go nuts waiting.


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## MRDPE (Mar 17, 2008)

- Don't overstudy topics that are not likely to be on the test - or will not account for a significant percentage of the content.

- Don't worry too much. _(may be easier said than done - but try to relax)_


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## engr_tam (Mar 24, 2008)

Take a wheeled suitcase for your books. I took two crates, and it was tough to lug those around. If you take a snack, take twizzlers, they're crumb-free, gives a sugar boost and isn't noisy.

I agree with the above posts - take two of the same calculator, it's easier to jump to the other one if the first one fails. You won't need a whole lot of references, no handtrucks or little red wagons or wheelbarrows. They let me have a clear plastic ruler too, that comes in useful when trying to read tables, but check w/ your state rules.

Good luck! It will all be over in 2 1/2 weeks. 

p.s. when exam is over, celebrate!!!


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