April/October 2020 Power PE Exam Prep

[Sparky Bill PE]

Cheers to you for taking it on again!

Idk much about any review courses. I'm sure someone will let you know soon. However, I keep seeing referrals for Zach Stone's course around here, so that might be worth checking out.

I have to give a shout out to Zach Stone's course. Great and precise information and well instructed. 

 

[squaretaper LIT AF PE]

Forgive my poor pitiful Phasor upside down one. I left it so I get a giggle each time I seen it (and too cheap to use another sticky). But my Glover book is coming around nicely!

View attachment 15719

Game plan for now is just to sit and read this whole book.

 

[MadamPirate PE]

Game plan for now is just to sit and read this whole book.

Believe it or not, that book is seriously readable for a textbook. 

 

[squaretaper LIT AF PE]

Believe it or not, that book is seriously readable for a textbook. 

Cool, because I have plenty of time on the bus.

 

[MadamPirate PE]

Cool, because I have plenty of time on the bus.

If you wanna read textbooks for fun, I’ve got a semiconductor device fundamentals book that’s pretty great I can recommend.

 

[ItsStudyTime!]

I have mixed feelings on that book as well. It does contain a lot of information in a fairly condensed format but I feel that EngPro Guide gives me more bang for my buck. It's been a while since I've looked at it but if I recall correctly I found the motor section in the Graffeo very helpful. I don't think i ever made it through the whole book though. I do remember working one of the theory examples and getting super frustrated. It was something I couldn't wrap my brain around at the time. I will definitely be going back through those examples.

I think on @ItsStudyTime! website below a ToC was posted for that book that may be more useful than what it currently contains. Depends on the version you have though. A good job was done of sectioning that book off by NCEES topic.

Thanks for that by the way @ItsStudyTime!

https://spreadsheetdirtbags.com/howtopassthepeexam/pe-exam-resources-electrical/

hey! no problem! I made the ToC for myself to use, so no reason not to share it! I have had a few people reach out about an 'updated version' of that ToC for the newer book version...but I haven't been able to help with that since I don't own the newer version (I have no need to own it). Hopefully someone else decides it's worth their time to update the ToC to the newer book version and can share it? I also (think?) I added a note on my website to message me through that 'contact me' thing and I can reply to that message and send the excel version of the ToC (instead of the PDF which is the downloadable file on the site) for easier editing. 

 

[ItsStudyTime!]

I ran out of reactions today. So, thank you!

Edit: Homagah this website is great! Thanks @ItsStudyTime!

I'm glad you like it! It was somewhat cathartic to write it all out after sitting for the exam. It felt like taking a giant pile of chaos out of my brain into a (hopefully) useful/understandable format. I get a little spark of joy every time someone finds it useful  Best of luck on your studies!

 

[Orchid PE]

How's the studying going?

 

[DLD PE]

Awful.  I took two full-timed practice exams (School of PE and Complex Imaginary) and got 80% and 79%.  Not great and those are easier problems compared to others I have.  Then last weekend I took the Eng Pro Guides full exam and scored 58%.  

I went back to look at some drill problems I worked on a week ago and I honestly couldn't remember doing some of them.  

I think I just need to keep working through more problems and just keep going but honestly I don't feel good about the whole thing at the moment.

 

[daydreambeliever]

How's the studying going?

I'm going through Glover right now and working some of those problems. I was happy with how much I was remembering after taking a year long break. The plan is to complete one of the Complex Imaginary exams on Sunday so I have a better gauge of where I'm at.

FINGERS CROSSED!!! 

 

[Orchid PE]

I took two full-timed practice exams (School of PE and Complex Imaginary) and got 80% and 79%.

Those aren't bad scores.

Then last weekend I took the Eng Pro Guides full exam and scored 58%.

58% Really isn't that bad. What sort of stuff got you caught up? Was it missing little errors?

 

[Orchid PE]

I'm going through Glover right now and working some of those problems. I was happy with how much I was remembering after taking a year long break. The plan is to complete one of the Complex Imaginary exams on Sunday so I have a better gauge of where I'm at.

FINGERS CROSSED!!! 

Good luck. Are you going to do it timed?

 

[daydreambeliever]

Awful.  I took two full-timed practice exams (School of PE and Complex Imaginary) and got 80% and 79%.  Not great and those are easier problems compared to others I have.  Then last weekend I took the Eng Pro Guides full exam and scored 58%.  

I went back to look at some drill problems I worked on a week ago and I honestly couldn't remember doing some of them.  

I think I just need to keep working through more problems and just keep going but honestly I don't feel good about the whole thing at the moment.

Were you consistently having trouble in certain topics or was it all over the board? If it is certain topics maybe you need to spend some time studying those. 

I'm typically all over the board and get overwhelmed with the amount of topics that i feel I'm struggling with. This time around I'm going to try to reel it in. My plan is to make lists of the topics I need to work on once I do a practice test then work on them one at a time. This is something you may already be doing. I tried last time but I like I said I would get overwhelmed and jump from one topic to the next too quickly I think.

 

[daydreambeliever]

Are you going to do it timed?

That's the plan. I don't remember the Complex Imaginary Practice Exams ever taking a full 8 eight hours. Last time around when I finished all the problems I would just stop and check solutions. This time if I finish early I'm going to spend time looking for errors and checking work like I would do on test day.

 

[Orchid PE]

I have the solutions manuals to Chapman and Saadat (and main book) if anyone needs them.

 

[DLD PE]

Those aren't bad scores.

58% Really isn't that bad. What sort of stuff got you caught up? Was it missing little errors?

Were you consistently having trouble in certain topics or was it all over the board? If it is certain topics maybe you need to spend some time studying those. 

I'm typically all over the board and get overwhelmed with the amount of topics that i feel I'm struggling with. This time around I'm going to try to reel it in. My plan is to make lists of the topics I need to work on once I do a practice test then work on them one at a time. This is something you may already be doing. I tried last time but I like I said I would get overwhelmed and jump from one topic to the next too quickly I think.

I would say it was a little bit of everything.  It was similar to what I went through last year.  I did well on codes and a few items actually came back to me.  There are a few problems where I thought I understood the concept but I wasn't using the right formulas (using line voltage instead of phase voltage, for example).  One problem I actually did correctly but was making a calculator error, and I mean a simple one.  I didn't finish the test in time to back and make the correction.  

I'm scheduled to take another timed exam on Saturday (CI #2), but I'm wondering if I should go back through the Eng Pro Guides exam, index all the problems I missed and see which sections I did poorest on and do some more review work instead of a timed exam on Saturday.  

 

[DLD PE]

That's the plan. I don't remember the Complex Imaginary Practice Exams ever taking a full 8 eight hours. Last time around when I finished all the problems I would just stop and check solutions. This time if I finish early I'm going to spend time looking for errors and checking work like I would do on test day.

Yes.  CI doesn't usually take 8 hours, but Eng Pro Guides took 8 hours and I didn't finish it with enough time to check a simple mistake I made.

 

[Orchid PE]

using line voltage instead of phase voltage

I would work drill after drill after drill on this. 

 

[DLD PE]

I have the School of PE workshop so I will probably go through these again for this topic.

 

[daydreambeliever]

but Eng Pro Guides took 8 hours

Yeah Eng Pro Guide goes way deeper than CI. I have written in my schedule (that I left on my desk at home) when I'm going to do the Eng Pro Guide Exam, I think it's a few weeks out.

I'm wondering if I should go back through the Eng Pro Guides exam, index all the problems I missed and see which sections I did poorest on and do some more review work instead of a timed exam on Saturday. 

I know everyone has different studying techniques but that's what I'm going to try to do when I know I need to work on something. Getting all the references I have and YouTubing anything I can on the topic.