How did you process PE Questions?

[bwin12]

This is a complicated question- basically I am trying to get a bead on how to read/process the PE Questions. Everything I have heard/read on this board is that the test tries to confuse you and if you aren't paying attention they will get you with simple answers.

So I'm working though the Practice Exams for the Civil PE Exam by Goswami, Question 102. I read the question, in particular the 6 needed 45 seconds cycle times and initially assumed 5 cycles would be needed- truck pulls up and the shovel should be ready to dump (1/2 a cycle) and then the truck can leave half way through the last cycle because the truck has his 6 CY. Apparently I was thinking too far into it, as the correct answer required 6 complete cycles. For people that have took the test, how do you balance this?

I went onto the next question- calculating the concrete cost was fine (and basically the question is over per the calculated cost), but they say "waterproofing compound", to me that is spray on and you are only going to put that on the water side of the dam. Per the solution, that's not correct, you need to put compound on the total surface area (not the ends of the structure though). In the construction world you wouldn't put a compound on the bottom of poured concrete.

Obviously, in both of these instances you can get to the right answer, but I would prefer to do each question once. Any advice on what NCEES will expect?

 

[PowerStroke79_PE]

This is a complicated question- basically I am trying to get a bead on how to read/process the PE Questions. Everything I have heard/read on this board is that the test tries to confuse you and if you aren't paying attention they will get you with simple answers.

So I'm working though the Practice Exams for the Civil PE Exam by Goswami, Question 102. I read the question, in particular the 6 needed 45 seconds cycle times and initially assumed 5 cycles would be needed- truck pulls up and the shovel should be ready to dump (1/2 a cycle) and then the truck can leave half way through the last cycle because the truck has his 6 CY. Apparently I was thinking too far into it, as the correct answer required 6 complete cycles. For people that have took the test, how do you balance this?

I went onto the next question- calculating the concrete cost was fine (and basically the question is over per the calculated cost), but they say "waterproofing compound", to me that is spray on and you are only going to put that on the water side of the dam. Per the solution, that's not correct, you need to put compound on the total surface area (not the ends of the structure though). In the construction world you wouldn't put a compound on the bottom of poured concrete.

Obviously, in both of these instances you can get to the right answer, but I would prefer to do each question once. Any advice on what NCEES will expect?

Problem 102: 

The only thing that got me on this question is the assumption of a two way travel. I think they would need to mention this and in the NCEES exam it probably would. I could be wrong. But my initial calcs reflected one way travel from loading to dumping. Maybe if the problem would have given an existing volume that would be more than 6 cy I would have assumed two way travel. 

The part where I look to much into it is where in my mind the only time the truck is idle is when it is being loaded. Therefore the .8 factor for idle should only be applied to that time. And the labor factor of .77 should be applied to the rest of the time (travel and dumping). In all honesty I've never seen the loader ready to dump, but down here its about the hours and they're running the clock. 

 

[PowerStroke79_PE]

This is a complicated question- basically I am trying to get a bead on how to read/process the PE Questions. Everything I have heard/read on this board is that the test tries to confuse you and if you aren't paying attention they will get you with simple answers.

So I'm working though the Practice Exams for the Civil PE Exam by Goswami, Question 102. I read the question, in particular the 6 needed 45 seconds cycle times and initially assumed 5 cycles would be needed- truck pulls up and the shovel should be ready to dump (1/2 a cycle) and then the truck can leave half way through the last cycle because the truck has his 6 CY. Apparently I was thinking too far into it, as the correct answer required 6 complete cycles. For people that have took the test, how do you balance this?

I went onto the next question- calculating the concrete cost was fine (and basically the question is over per the calculated cost), but they say "waterproofing compound", to me that is spray on and you are only going to put that on the water side of the dam. Per the solution, that's not correct, you need to put compound on the total surface area (not the ends of the structure though). In the construction world you wouldn't put a compound on the bottom of poured concrete.

Obviously, in both of these instances you can get to the right answer, but I would prefer to do each question once. Any advice on what NCEES will expect?

Problem 103: 

Waterproofing would go anywhere the concrete is exposed to environment (in my mind), not just against the water. Now, if we are talking about a wall, and the interior is exposed to water/salts such as in a pool room, then yes the waterproofing would be in the interior side of the wall and not the exterior. However, I did not think of adding waterproof to the floor dimension. This does not make sense to me. First of all this would mean you spray before you pour and I've just never done that so maybe I was overpaid. :-( (Then again it was not for a dam) But its hard to think the questions wouldn't clarify this for the PE exam. 

In my situation maybe 1 or 2 questions I did not understand thinking back. The others that I got wrong I simply couldn't find or did not know. The questions were clear though. 

 

[smahurin]

I can't speak to goswami's book as I don't have it, but in general my experience with both the PE and SE exams was that simple is correct.  This doesn't mean the questions are easy, but I would generally say if you find yourself bouncing around and trying to use multiple equations and multiple references for a single problem you're most likely over-complicating things.  My experience was you find the question, or find the reference, plug in numbers and move on to the next problem.  Some of the problems can even be solved by simple unit cancellation with the given data.  That's not to say there aren't or might not be problems with multiple steps, but I think they tended to be the exception when I took my exams in 2014 and 2015.

 

[youngmotivatedengineer]

If my memory serves me right, many if not all of the questionable items were clearly clarified in the questions.  For example when dealing with soil quantities,  the question would state if they wanted you to start with bank volume or if you would have to calculate for loose volume.