# How did it go?



## HornTootinEE (Apr 11, 2011)

How did it go for everybody?


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## va_gator (Apr 11, 2011)

I made some silly mistakes, after researching the topics online afterwards. Now I can't sleep. Overall feeling: iffy


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## DannyV (Apr 11, 2011)

I think I did very well on the material that I studied from the Chelapati book, the PPI book, Power Analysis and Electrical Machinery book. But overall felt really bad coming out of the exam because I believe I was deceived into believing I was ready for the exam. It seems that the NCEES went through the reference material I used and on purposely picked topics that were not cover in my books… I hope not to offend anybody here but this is how I feel about them right now. :redface:


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## bingcrosbyb (Apr 11, 2011)

I'll repost from main forum for the EE's in the house.

EE - Power. "You sunk my battleship."

*Preparation Time/Materials:* 250 total hours. 5 textbooks, prep coursework notebook, 2 notebooks of graduate class material, calculators, snacks, rolling suitcase.

*Money:* ~$1,550.

*General Observations: * Arrived at my site 30 minutes prior to report time. Noticed that many others had literally libraries and libraries of books. Someone had a giant wagon with bungie cords holding all of the books together. Others just had a single piece of paper. Wild. I randomly started thinking of a national geographic special with narration by Morgan Freeman on PE test taking habits. I needed that laugh to clear my head.

*AM Session:* Felt the AM session was great. Only ended up with 6-7 that I didn't have a single solid answer or couldn't find it in my reference. I finished slightly early and checked only some of my work.

*PM Session:* Total unadulterated bloodbath. Couldn't seem to concentrate enough to find the equations I needed. Calculator was spitting out answers that were out of this world. Saw stuff that I barely covered in droves. About 2-3 hours into the afternoon, my brain felt like it had been through a dishwasher and I started hopping around from question to question. Not good. I will be lucky if I got a quarter to half right. I might as well have taken another discipline in the afternoon or gone to work. A monkey may have been able to do better.

*Final Thoughts:* As I left the exam area, I felt numb, dumb, and a little crushed. I felt like I blew the morning session out of the water. Then the PE got off a torpedo as I was heading to collect my stamp, promotion, and better life. I'm not very good at guessing and doing the math in my head all weekend I kept envisioning a percentage score in the upper 60s with an afternoon diagnostic that simply says "monkey". 6 months of neglecting my wife and family might be for nothing in the end except doing it all over again. I know the pass rate for repeaters is low, but what is the divorce rate?

Oh well. If I recall from a coworker, last years results were released in around 45-50 days following the exam. I think he got his in late May. We shall see. I guess the ultimate decision is now do I crack open another book....or another beer?


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## snickerd3 (Apr 11, 2011)

DannyV said:


> I think I did very well on the material that I studied from the Chelapati book, the PPI book, Power Analysis and Electrical Machinery book. But overall felt really bad coming out of the exam because I believe I was deceived into believing I was ready for the exam. It seems that the NCEES went through the reference material I used and on purposely picked topics that were not cover in my books… I hope not to offend anybody here but this is how I feel about them right now. :redface:


i know several of the tests were new format this time through...environmental was one, maybe electrical was another?


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## DannyV (Apr 11, 2011)

snickerd3 said:


> DannyV said:
> 
> 
> > I think I did very well on the material that I studied from the Chelapati book, the PPI book, Power Analysis and Electrical Machinery book. But overall felt really bad coming out of the exam because I believe I was deceived into believing I was ready for the exam. It seems that the NCEES went through the reference material I used and on purposely picked topics that were not cover in my books… I hope not to offend anybody here but this is how I feel about them right now. :redface:
> ...



Well, there were curveballs and a bunch of "WTF" questions. After resting all weekend and reviewing my working references in the office I realized that most of my "educated guess" were right on the spot. I still think I passed. Or at least I'm convinced of it unless proven otherwise.... hahaha. Why stress now if we are still 12 weeks away from finding out? I can drive myself :screwloose: by then.... LOL


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## Crazydock (Apr 11, 2011)

I can say that the Electrical Power exam was challenging for me, some of questions were so easy but others definitely tough for me. In my opinion, AM was worser for me but i did the PM part much better. Overall, the exam creators did a great job and the exam was balanced. If I fail, I will study harder to improve some topics that I did prepare well on the exam but I hope that I will pass it  arty-smiley-048:

Good luck for everyone.

MWB


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## trish (Apr 11, 2011)

What is the passing zone?

Thanks


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## bingcrosbyb (Apr 11, 2011)

Crazydock said:


> I can say that the Electrical Power exam was challenging for me, some of questions were so easy but others definitely tough for me. In my opinion, AM was worser for me but i did the PM part much better. Overall, the exam creators did a great job and the exam was balanced. If I fail, I will study harder to improve some topics that I did prepare well on the exam but I hope that I will pass it  arty-smiley-048:
> Good luck for everyone.
> 
> MWB


I agree......to a degree. Even though I put in over 250 hours of studying the widest range of topics imaginable, I still felt like there were many more fastballs, curveballs, and plain old WTF! questions than I was expecting. No amount of studying would have helped me get those problems right.


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## monsterbbb (Apr 11, 2011)

I only have about 22 sure answers for morning section, and had 4-5 very good guesses. So I guess that was bad.

the afternoon section at first caught me off guard. I was in panic mode the first hour; somehow I manage to calm down during 2nd hour and decide to do all the questions that I can actually understand what it asked for. Then go back to those questions once seem impossible to solve, and found out there were alot of questions are very easy actually. So I manage to have about 29 sure answers + 2-4 very good guesses.

my guess method is use my sure answer as reference, picked the least chosen one as my guess to avg back the answer distribution.


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## papa j (Apr 12, 2011)

Crazydock said:


> I can say that the Electrical Power exam was challenging for me, some of questions were so easy but others definitely tough for me. In my opinion, AM was worser for me but i did the PM part much better. Overall, the exam creators did a great job and the exam was balanced. If I fail, I will study harder to improve some topics that I did prepare well on the exam but I hope that I will pass it  arty-smiley-048:
> Good luck for everyone.
> 
> MWB


I took Power and that was my experience s well. The morning session kicked my butt some, but the afternoon seemed simple after that.

Overall feeling is good, assuming that I answered the question that they were asking. There were a few that the hardest part what was they were looking for, seemed like.


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## DannyV (Apr 12, 2011)

I felt that way also, the morning session kicked my behind. But it is possible it was just emotional for me, that first problem caught me completely off guard. I didn't want to believe that after 20 minutes I couldn't do the problem... LOL Eventually I skipped that problem and came back after I was done with all my morning problems to solve it. I noticed the most difficult problems were stacked towards the beggining of the morning and afternoon session. I wonder if it was done on purpose to mess with our psychological well being?.... LOL


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## sc57 (Apr 12, 2011)

AM was tough, PM was not as bad. I hope not fail for 1 or 2 points.


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## baddriver (Apr 12, 2011)

sc57 said:


> AM was tough, PM was not as bad. I hope not fail for 1 or 2 points.


Interesting. I took the power exam as well and felt the morning was much better for me. I felt I crushed it with only 1-2 questions I was unsure about. The afternoon session I was more shakey with probably 5-8 questions I was unsure about.

Overall I felt the test was tough, but fair. I was well prepared with the reference books I had.


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## papa j (Apr 12, 2011)

DannyV said:


> I noticed the most difficult problems were stacked towards the beggining of the morning and afternoon session. I wonder if it was done on purpose to mess with our psychological well being?.... LOL


I noticed that as well. Fortunately, my standard test taking policy is to go through all the problems first. If I know the answer, circle it. If it's a computation, set it up but don't solve it. Otherwise, i just skipped it. Get through in 1/2 hour or so. Then I can take a deep breath and dive in with a little more confidence.

Having said that, the first two problems in the afternoon session I had no idea what to do and I was pretty sure none of my reference material had anything for it. My thought was "wow, this is gonna be fun :smileyballs:"


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## DannyV (Apr 12, 2011)

papa j said:


> DannyV said:
> 
> 
> > I noticed the most difficult problems were stacked towards the beggining of the morning and afternoon session. I wonder if it was done on purpose to mess with our psychological well being?.... LOL
> ...



Exactly, the funny thing is that I have references in my office for both problems but I didn't take them... :brickwall:


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## monsterbbb (Apr 12, 2011)

DannyV said:


> I felt that way also, the morning session kicked my behind. But it is possible it was just emotional for me, that first problem caught me completely off guard. I didn't want to believe that after 20 minutes I couldn't do the problem... LOL Eventually I skipped that problem and came back after I was done with all my morning problems to solve it. I noticed the most difficult problems were stacked towards the beggining of the morning and afternoon session. I wonder if it was done on purpose to mess with our psychological well being?.... LOL



the first question of AM and PM section are easy if we understand what they ask, it is a matter of solving math equations. But I felt the question was design poorly. Maybe it is design to confuse us purposely.


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## va_gator (Apr 12, 2011)

I feel the same way... Overall, the questions were not too complex, and it came down to whether or not you knew the topic and had a reference/formula for it.


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## bingcrosbyb (Apr 12, 2011)

monsterbbb said:


> DannyV said:
> 
> 
> > I felt that way also, the morning session kicked my behind. But it is possible it was just emotional for me, that first problem caught me completely off guard. I didn't want to believe that after 20 minutes I couldn't do the problem... LOL Eventually I skipped that problem and came back after I was done with all my morning problems to solve it. I noticed the most difficult problems were stacked towards the beggining of the morning and afternoon session. I wonder if it was done on purpose to mess with our psychological well being?.... LOL
> ...


If you found a question to be poorly designed, you should use the comment form under your account on the NCEES.org website. You have up to 10 days following the exam to submit your comment. I also found some questions to be terribly worded and simply unorthodox practice in the field. I've submitted my comments.


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## gr8gatzby (Apr 12, 2011)

bingcrosbyb said:


> If you found a question to be poorly designed, you should use the comment form under your account on the NCEES.org website. You have up to 10 days following the exam to submit your comment. I also found some questions to be terribly worded and simply unorthodox practice in the field. I've submitted my comments.


Bing - thanks, I just submitted some comments as well. A lot of you felt pretty good for the afternoon it seems like. I'm the opposite, but the last time I felt better for the afternoon though, so we'll see. Overall though, not too great unfortunately. Good luck to all of you though!


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## lomenop (Apr 12, 2011)

I took the electronics exam, the PM was more difficult for me but not by much. I now realize I made silly mistakes on a few problems that should have been gimme points. I can't remember if my answers were "close enough"! Argh

Does any one else feel like there may have been mistakes on NCEES's part on the selectable solutions? I know I encountered atleast two problems. One which was simple enough and the other one may have been a clarity issue (I solved for everything I could have in the circuit, still no reasonable choice among the answers provided). I reported them to NCEES.

Like va_gator said, having the right reference/formula is key on several problems. I wish I would have had more references/examples on the type of problems that were not my strong points. Just last night I found my Comm book that I thought I had sold back when I was still in school. I'm sure that would have help on a few probs! Doh!

If I fail, I know where to improve on to pass now knowing/getting a feel for the actual exam.


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## schmidty99 (Apr 13, 2011)

lomenop said:


> I took the electronics exam, the PM was more difficult for me but not by much. I now realize I made silly mistakes on a few problems that should have been gimme points. I can't remember if my answers were "close enough"! Argh
> Does any one else feel like there may have been mistakes on NCEES's part on the selectable solutions? I know I encountered atleast two problems. One which was simple enough and the other one may have been a clarity issue (I solved for everything I could have in the circuit, still no reasonable choice among the answers provided). I reported them to NCEES.
> 
> Like va_gator said, having the right reference/formula is key on several problems. I wish I would have had more references/examples on the type of problems that were not my strong points. Just last night I found my Comm book that I thought I had sold back when I was still in school. I'm sure that would have help on a few probs! Doh!
> ...


Hmmm. I also took the electronics exam and I felt the PM portion was much "easier" for me than the AM. Not sure why, things just went better. My main issue was spending too much time on the AM problems. It left me with way too many circles to fill in in the last minute. Maybe I just managed my time better in the PM. Anyway, I feel that if I would have did as well on the AM as I think I did on the PM I will pass. Since I stunk up the joint on the AM, I'm not sure. I really don't want to try a fourth time in October....

As far as NCEES mistakes, they could all have been mistakes as far I know. I do seem to remember a couple questions that were poorly worded, but I'll be damned if I can remember them now.


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## southfloridaengineer (Apr 13, 2011)

I took the electronics exam as well. I completed the AM section no problem. Worked everything problem twice and still had over an hour left at the end. I hit several problems I had idea how to solve, but in many cases I was able to find the exact formula I needed in one of my books.

I found the PM section much harder. I spent way too much time on the first couple of problems. I had to guess at 8 problems in the afternoon section. I don't think I'll have a stellar score, but hopefully I'll do well enough to pass. My Signal Processing book could have given me another 4-5 answers had I brought it.


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## orion85 (Apr 13, 2011)

Lots of Greg Maddux type curve balls, both morning and afternoon. With that said, after going through the exam I started looking at it closer and saw it wasn't as bad as it looked. I don't think any more or any less studying would have made a difference.

I don't know about anyone else, but I relied more on experience, general knowledge, and common sense for this exam.


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## schmidty99 (Apr 13, 2011)

southfloridaengineer said:


> I took the electronics exam as well. I completed the AM section no problem. Worked everything problem twice and still had over an hour left at the end. I hit several problems I had idea how to solve, but in many cases I was able to find the exact formula I needed in one of my books.
> I found the PM section much harder. I spent way too much time on the first couple of problems. I had to guess at 8 problems in the afternoon section. I don't think I'll have a stellar score, but hopefully I'll do well enough to pass. My Signal Processing book could have given me another 4-5 answers had I brought it.



southfloridaengineer:

What books are you using were helpful for the A.M., and which Signal Processing book are you using? I had lots of trouble with the A.M. part, maybe a better reference would help. Time management was a big problem for me in the A.M. I think I panicked toward the end....Although, I feel pretty good about the PM, maybe I can squeak by and pass somehow. It comes down to guessing for me.... :wacko:


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## Deadbeat_Mike (Apr 13, 2011)

trish said:


> What is the passing zone?
> Thanks


Another useless PPI product!


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## Deadbeat_Mike (Apr 13, 2011)

I feel pretty good about the whole thing. I took the power exam.

I only had one guess on the exam in the afternoon. I had one stupid mistake that I am aware of. Otherwise I got matching answers for all of the problems. I am shelving all of my books at the office.

It did take me a while to figure out one particular problem that a lot of people were probably sweating over EARLY in the afternoon... then it dawned on my what was going on. Had to reverse engineer it from the answer choices.

Here's to holding our breath for the next 7 weeks or so!


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## NorCalEng (Apr 13, 2011)

orion85 said:


> Lots of Greg Maddux type curve balls, both morning and afternoon. With that said, after going through the exam I started looking at it closer and saw it wasn't as bad as it looked. I don't think any more or any less studying would have made a difference.
> I don't know about anyone else, but I relied more on experience, general knowledge, and common sense for this exam.



Yep. I could have prepared for this thing a year in advance, taken two prep courses, do and understand all the sample exams available, and still feel the same way because the questions are so sprawled out across the spectrum and the way it is asked doubles the hard. Having said that, it was an ok test, I'll need luck... lots of it. :fart: ldman: :waiting: :Banane26: :beerchug: :icon_anal: :bananapowerslide: :mf_followthroughfart:


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## SpacedOut31416 (Apr 13, 2011)

baddriver said:


> sc57 said:
> 
> 
> > AM was tough, PM was not as bad. I hope not fail for 1 or 2 points.
> ...


Would you please share the references and prep materials you used?


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## orion85 (Apr 14, 2011)

I took the following in:

- Electrical Machines, Drives, &amp; Power Systems - Wildi

- TestMasters Binder

- NCEES Practice Exams

- 2008 NEC Handbook

- NEMA VFD Guidebook (recommended by this forum)

- Camara Handbook

- All my prepared cheat sheets with formulas

- CEM (Certified Energy Manager) Study Guide

- 2 FX115 Casios


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## SpacedOut31416 (Apr 14, 2011)

orion85 said:


> I took the following in:
> - Electrical Machines, Drives, &amp; Power Systems - Wildi
> 
> - TestMasters Binder
> ...


Thanks very much for these suggestions!


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## baddriver (Apr 15, 2011)

orion85 said:


> I took the following in:
> - Electrical Machines, Drives, &amp; Power Systems - Wildi
> 
> - TestMasters Binder
> ...


I had a similar set of books, which I culled from recommendations on this board.

- Camara Handbook (the PPI Power book and sample exam. This is a great one stop shop for many power topics)

- Electrical Machines, Drives, &amp; Power Systems - Wildi (great book, I love the simple way he breaks down complex topics)

- 2008 NEC tabbed to the max. (I wish I brought the Handbook in retrospect)

- Power Systems Analysis, Grainger/Stevenson. (great old school book, a bit heavy on complex math but covers a lot of complex topics)

- 3 ring binder of all my loose reference material. (problem index guides, wikipedia and manufacturer white papers on various topics I thought would be covered on the exam)

- NCEES Sample Exam.

- EC&amp;M Handbook, Paschal. (This is a great little resource, a nice introduction for those new to the field. I use this as a reference of the MVA method for short circuit calculations. It's better than any other I've found).

- 2 FX115 Casios

- NEMA VFD Guidebook (recommended by this forum. I didn't bring this even though I had printed it out and skimmed through it previously. If I go again I will definitely bring it.)


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## BamaBino (Apr 15, 2011)

To the people that took that the Power Exam, were there areas covered on the exam that are Not included in the Power Exam Specifications listing?

http://www.ncees.org/Documents/Public/Exam...0Apr%202009.pdf

Thanks.


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## willsee (Apr 15, 2011)

BamaBino said:


> To the people that took that the Power Exam, were there areas covered on the exam that are Not included in the Power Exam Specifications listing?http://www.ncees.org/Documents/Public/Exam...0Apr%202009.pdf
> 
> Thanks.


No

But even if there were on ONE particular exam that doesn't mean it wouldn't be covered in the next exam.


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## bingcrosbyb (Apr 16, 2011)

BamaBino said:


> To the people that took that the Power Exam, were there areas covered on the exam that are Not included in the Power Exam Specifications listing?http://www.ncees.org/Documents/Public/Exam...0Apr%202009.pdf
> 
> Thanks.


If you study based on the percentages for each topic, you will be *royally screwed.*

I honestly wouldn't even pay attention to those numbers.


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## DannyV (Apr 16, 2011)

bingcrosbyb said:


> BamaBino said:
> 
> 
> > To the people that took that the Power Exam, were there areas covered on the exam that are Not included in the Power Exam Specifications listing?http://www.ncees.org/Documents/Public/Exam...0Apr%202009.pdf
> ...


My advice is to make sure you understand every topic on their list and forget about their percentage. Make sure you know how to do simple problem for EVERY topic first, then start doing some more in depth studying. Like that you won't be caught with you pants down... Like must of us did... LOL


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