Ideal Study Material and Pain Points

[KSchu]

What do you believe would make the perfect study material for the PE? Is it all about the practice exam questions, or do review courses provide more help? If you could change anything about your study material what would it be? What have you found to be most helpful/least helpful? 

 

[landolakes]

Im on my 3rd attempt and i can at least trll you what makes me feel like im on the right track this time...

previously i made assumptions amd shortcuts... "just focus on NCEES problems bc MERM problems too involved" or "oh a course guarantees you to pass, that should be good".

Each attempt i did same thing and not good enough.

Main focus, Practice problems... start with MERM and go from there, they are involved but get you to flip through the book and become familiar with locations of topics/formulas/appendicies/etc. Problems really helped me bc many times i said "dammit there was a exam question almost exactly like this that couldve gotten right". Im doing each relevant chapter questions twice... 

SMS has good problems similar to MERM...

Many problems youll memorize the technique (pumps, mass balance, etc) and others the require you to peek at answers take ur own notes down. Id use my first run to see how many i can solve myself, peek at answers and figure out the approach... take notes. Second run i go about it with my notes... maybe third run if i feel i need it.

Finally the NCEES to gauge the involvement and types of problems. Again, take the exam at least 2-3 times until mastery.

 

[justin-hawaii]

Hi KSchu,

Which Mechanical PE exam do you plan on taking?  This will help us to provide better recommendations.  

Hi landolakes,

Which exam are you taking?

 

[landolakes]

METF

 

[justin-hawaii]

Hi landolakes,

Your method and approach definitely appears like you have everything on track.  It is similar to the approach that I used and also similar to the approach used by people on this post:  

 

[Ramnares P.E.]

I personally don't see the need for a review course.  However, if you have been out of school for a long time, need to review fundamentals, or have a problem self motivating to study and need the structure, it would be worthwhile.

 

[Audi Driver P.E.]

Just an FYI, obviously you have to know yourself and your limitations, but I had been out of school 20 years when I took the exam.  I did not use a review course and passed the first time using, essentially, Ram's method linked above.

 

[starquest]

Just an FYI, obviously you have to know yourself and your limitations, but I had been out of school 20 years when I took the exam.  I did not use a review course and passed the first time using, essentially, Ram's method linked above.

Ditto

 

[FenderSteve]

Since self study wasn't very helpful to me, I signed up for a review course. (Also, my employer paid for it, so there really was no reason not to take one)

Dr. Tom's course is pretty much made for people taking the thermal fluids exam, so I would recommend looking into that. The only thing I did differently from what he recommended is I bought Lindeburg's unit conversion book. It was way more handy on exam day than the MERM.

My least favorite resource was the Six Minute Solutions book. The problems just didn't seem to help that much in comparison to the review course or the NCEES problems.

Get that conversion book (it's cheap) and you won't regret it.