# Feedback for PPI's "SE Structural Engineering Buildings Practice Exam"?



## ItzmeJ0e (May 13, 2021)

I'm working on making updates to PPI's "SE Structural Engineering Buildings Practice Exam" for the new code list. For those of you that took the exam recently and used my book as part of your preparation, I'd appreciate any feedback you might have so I can make improvements for the next edition. In particular:

-How did the difficulty and length of the practice exam compare to the actual test?
-Are there any topics you think are important that aren't covered by at least one of the practice problems?
-Are there any problems you think are poorly written or confusing that should be replaced?
-Are there any solutions you think are unclear and could be improved? (In general suspected errors should be reported here: Report an Error | PPI, A Kaplan Company. But feel free to post those here too if you'd like.)

Any other suggestions for improvements are greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

Joe


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## Engineerbabu (May 13, 2021)

Apologies for my comment earlier! I clearly didn't read the topic properly. 
I have a 4th edition of the book and here is my comparison of vertical and lateral.
Vertical Difficulty- AM portion was consistent with the practice test mentioned above. I would say the PM portion of the exam was a little difficult compared to the test. 
Lateral Difficulty- I found AM portion of the exam to be easier than the practice test, but the PM portion was way difficult in the exam. Difficult in the sense there was one question which one wouldn't expect in the exam. Other questions were pretty consistent with the practice exam.


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## Tac42turtle (May 14, 2021)

Just to help clarify, it sounds to me like the author of the PPI SE Practice Exam is asking for constructive feedback on his book to incorporate while he is updating for the new codes.

Joe, I haven't used it yet but plan to for the Oct SE exam. Looking forward to the updated version!


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## organix (May 17, 2021)

Minor comment. Since ACI does not change, maybe this issue could be missed:

There’s a coupling beam problem. I had looked semi recently and think it was problem 72, maybe 73. Either way, the solution is correct, but the letter shown as “correct” is a typo. It should be letter B and not D.


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## ItzmeJ0e (May 18, 2021)

Engineerbabu said:


> Apologies for my comment earlier! I clearly didn't read the topic properly.
> I have a 4th edition of the book and here is my comparison of vertical and lateral.
> Vertical Difficulty- AM portion was consistent with the practice test mentioned above. I would say the PM portion of the exam was a little difficult compared to the test.
> Lateral Difficulty- I found AM portion of the exam to be easier than the practice test, but the PM portion was way difficult in the exam. Difficult in the sense there was one question which one wouldn't expect in the exam. Other questions were pretty consistent with the practice exam.


Thanks for the feedback. In general my goal was to make the practice exam similar in difficulty or slightly more difficult than the actual test. Based on your response, I will try to tweak the lateral PM to be more difficult.


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## ItzmeJ0e (May 18, 2021)

organix said:


> Minor comment. Since ACI does not change, maybe this issue could be missed:
> 
> There’s a coupling beam problem. I had looked semi recently and think it was problem 72, maybe 73. Either way, the solution is correct, but the letter shown as “correct” is a typo. It should be letter B and not D.


Thank you! This was already corrected in the 5th Edition. The correct answer to question #72 is (B) 96 kips.


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## Reverse Polish (May 18, 2021)

I'm going mostly off memory here, but I found the difficulty of the practice exams in the 5th Edition to be very comparable to the difficulty of the actual exam. If I had any recommendations, I would say that treatment of deep foundations (in so far as the SE exam covers deep foundations) and diaphragm / subdiaphragm analysis and design could use a bit more emphasis, but I understand that it is wholly impossible and unrealistic to cover the entire range of possibilities that NCEES might throw at you on a particular exam. 

In hindsight, thank you for providing such an excellent resource.


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## organix (May 18, 2021)

ItzmeJ0e said:


> Thank you! This was already corrected in the 5th Edition. The correct answer to question #72 is (B) 96 kips.


Oh awesome. I didn't even realize I had an older version, haha.

If you do any bigger changes to the PM portion, I'd say it would be beneficial to add in some problems that test seismic irregularities. I rarely see PM example problems that ask to identify and/or design for these. For example, in my studies, I haven't found much that detailed well the design for vertical irregularity 4 or horizontal irregularity 4.

With that said, as RP stated above, it's not realistic to cover it all and I do think the practice exam you put together is a pretty good example to set one's expectations.


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## Shafiullah (May 22, 2021)

ItzmeJ0e said:


> I'm working on making updates to PPI's "SE Structural Engineering Buildings Practice Exam" for the new code list. For those of you that took the exam recently and used my book as part of your preparation, I'd appreciate any feedback you might have so I can make improvements for the next edition. In particular:
> 
> -How did the difficulty and length of the practice exam compare to the actual test?
> -Are there any topics you think are important that aren't covered by at least one of the practice problems?
> ...


When can we expect the availability of updated PPI's "SE Structural Engineering Buildings Practice Exam


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## ItzmeJ0e (May 25, 2021)

organix said:


> Oh awesome. I didn't even realize I had an older version, haha.
> 
> If you do any bigger changes to the PM portion, I'd say it would be beneficial to add in some problems that test seismic irregularities. I rarely see PM example problems that ask to identify and/or design for these. For example, in my studies, I haven't found much that detailed well the design for vertical irregularity 4 or horizontal irregularity 4.
> 
> With that said, as RP stated above, it's not realistic to cover it all and I do think the practice exam you put together is a pretty good example to set one's expectations.


Thanks for the suggestion. I'll try to add a seismic irregularity question to one of the PM example problems.

I'll also add that the "2018 IBC SEAOC Structural/Seismic Design Manual Volume 1" is a good reference for these types of problems. I believe they have a worked example for each type of irregularity. 








2018 IBC SEAOC Structural/Seismic Design Manual Volume 1: Code Application Examples


Would you like more information about ICC eBooks? Click here to learn more about this format where you can have full functionality for your books both online and offline. Are you looking to buy the entire collection of seismic design manuals? Click here to save on a 4-book bundle.




shop.iccsafe.org


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## ItzmeJ0e (May 25, 2021)

Shafiullah said:


> When can we expect the availability of updated PPI's "SE Structural Engineering Buildings Practice Exam


Not sure yet. I'm about half way through making edits and expect to be done in about four weeks. But then PPI will need some time to incorporate the edits and print the book. I'll let you know when I have a firm date.

So far, there have not been many substantial changes (not like last round of updates when there were majors changes to ASCE 7 wind loads). Mostly just minor changes to some code section numbers in the solutions. Using the current version (5th edition) will probably work just fine for most people until the new one is published.


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## organix (May 27, 2021)

ItzmeJ0e said:


> Thanks for the suggestion. I'll try to add a seismic irregularity question to one of the PM example problems.
> 
> I'll also add that the "2018 IBC SEAOC Structural/Seismic Design Manual Volume 1" is a good reference for these types of problems. I believe they have a worked example for each type of irregularity.
> 
> ...


Thanks for the recommendation. I haven't looked at the 2018 version, but I did see 2012 and 2015. Unfortunately, they don't get much into the analysis of the irregularities I'm curious about in those versions.


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## StaticallyAdmissible (Sep 26, 2021)

ItzmeJ0e said:


> I'm working on making updates to PPI's "SE Structural Engineering Buildings Practice Exam" for the new code list. For those of you that took the exam recently and used my book as part of your preparation, I'd appreciate any feedback you might have so I can make improvements for the next edition. In particular:
> 
> -How did the difficulty and length of the practice exam compare to the actual test?
> -Are there any topics you think are important that aren't covered by at least one of the practice problems?
> ...


Is there anywhere to purchase the updated PDF and not the full book? I’ve gone through the 5th edition without the code updates. I’m curious to see if problems have changed. Thanks for the great resource!


ItzmeJ0e said:


> I'm working on making updates to PPI's "SE Structural Engineering Buildings Practice Exam" for the new code list. For those of you that took the exam recently and used my book as part of your preparation, I'd appreciate any feedback you might have so I can make improvements for the next edition. In particular:
> 
> -How did the difficulty and length of the practice exam compare to the actual test?
> -Are there any topics you think are important that aren't covered by at least one of the practice problems?
> ...


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## ItzmeJ0e (Sep 27, 2021)

Anyone who purchased the 5th edition in the last couple of months should have received a PDF showing all the code updates. If you purchased the 5th edition but don't have the Code Update PDF, please reach out to [email protected]


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## bassist (Apr 3, 2022)

Hello, @ItzmeJ0e 
Thanks for updating the practice exams. I just solved the lateral practice exam from the latest 6th edition. I noticed 2 possible errors in the breadth solution to Q 60 & 76.
Q60: The wind pressure Pz should be 0.057ksf instead of 0.0479ksf, 0.057ksf gives a force of 28.7 kips so D should be the correct answer?
Q77: the higher rho (reinforcement ratio) factor should control but the solution says that 0.00572 controls and 0.008 doesn't control. If 0.008 controls then we get s = 1.7" instead of s=2.33".


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## ItzmeJ0e (Apr 5, 2022)

Thanks for your comments, @bassist. I agree regarding Q60. This has been recorded in PPI's errata and will be fixed in the next printing.

For Q76 (not Q77), AASHTO Sec. 5.11.4.1.4 says you need to meet EITHER spiral reinforcement ratio, so it is ok to use the lower value of 0.00572. I believe the solution is ok as presented, but let me know if you disagree.

One more correction to point out... For the vertical breath module Q4, the ice maps in ASCE 7-16 were redrawn and equation 10.4-5 no longer has a factor of 2. The question will be revised such that the nominal ice thickness is now 1.50 in. instead of 0.75 in. and the design ice thickness in the solution will still be 1.78 in.

Apologies for any confusion and good luck to those preparing for the April exam.


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## bassist (Apr 6, 2022)

Appreciate the Response, @ItzmeJ0e. Yes, I meant Q76, and I disagree with you. 5.11.4.1.4 says that _rho _shall satisfy equation 5.11.4.1.4-1 AND 5.6.4.6. AASHTO 8th ed. mentions seismic should not govern before using equation 5.6.4.6-1. Since it's a seismic performance zone 4, I think equation 5.11.4.1.4-1 must be satisfied. I am only referring to the 8th edition of AASHTO as it is the version we need to use for the exam.


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## ItzmeJ0e (Apr 6, 2022)

Yep, I agree. I'll get it fixed. Thanks for your thorough review.


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