Online course for PE thermal and Fluid

[Saad85]

Would you please advise what is the best online course for the PE mechanical thermal and fluid discipline?

 

[Aldo87]

Online courses are expensive, the pace will not up to you. I would strongly recommend self-study, get the MERM (13 ed, make sure you read all relevant chapters) , PPI practice questions, unit conversion book, print out steam tables from the web, and NCEES practice exam (there are some correction to the current version) and you'll be all set. 

PPI prep. materials (MERM & practice questions) are will written, the practice questions are much harder than the actual exam, which is an excellent thing, (you'll notice when you start working on the NCEES practice exam).

Roll up your sleeves and get to work!

V:

Good luck!

 

[Saad85]

I have failed in this exam three times and I would like to have comprehensive review course to pass this exam

 

[justin-hawaii]

Hi Saad85,

I am sorry you did not pass this time.  I took a look at the Thermal and Fluids survey and some people recommended Dr. Tom's Classroom.  Do you mind sharing your diagnostics?  It could also help us point you in the right direction.

 

[landolakes]

Saad, have you taken a course before? I failed 3x as well and passed on 4th. Two of previous times I took School of PE and Dr Toms. Both were good courses, however my successful attempt was starting with problems only. 

Both classes I took provide good concept and help with the basics of each topic... sample problems help too, but keep in mind those will not be enough. 

School of PE does not go into the depth of Dr Tom of giving you a study plan and organizing folders. I can tell you that the test does not allow much time to fumble through folders... if you have done enough sample problems on the test, you will have memorized almost every formula. Dr Toms is 750 plus cost of MERM, SMS, NCEES, and conversion book. SoPE is 990, plus those books. 

Courses are great for a refresher, but problems are the key. I used NCEES 2016, SMS TF, Engineer Pro Guide, and MERM sample problems (from relevant chapters). 

 

[landolakes]

Both my costs were for the "On Demand" pre-recorded sessions... 

 

[Ramnares P.E.]

Dr. Tom's seems to be the go to for thermal fluids.

 

[apford]

I did Dr. Tom's class, and it was OK. The one thing I would caution you about it to make sure you review the exam spec, his class does not cover all the material you'll need for the test. Make sure you review things like free body diagrams and basic statics, etc. I took his class and the NCEES 2016 practice test and thought I would be covered, turns out there were quite a few topics on the test that weren't in either of those resources. Made for a harrowing test experience. 

If I had failed, I don't think I would have taken the class again, but I wouldn't have a problem recommending it to someone looking for a more directed method of studying. 

 

[amats42]

The course that I took taught me very little material. It was massively helpful in understanding the significance of a PE license, the difficulty of passing the exam, the importance of setting aside 3 months of study time, and how useful a calendar and study schedule is to meeting this goal.

As others have said, problems are king and a class will really take valuable time away from working problems. For me, the course was invaluable only in that it forced me to stay on schedule and allowed me to meet other test takers to stay motivated. If you can't motivate yourself to study, then an in-person class may be the key for you. However, in my experience an online course will not provide that motivation.

If you are struggling with the test, practice problems with heavy MERM annotation, cross-reference, and tabbing will likely be what pushes you into a passing score. There were countless problems where looking up the basic formula (found by looking a keyword up in my annotated index) was all that was required to solve the problem. I also found a handful of answers from my personal index additions. You really need lots of hours getting familiar with the MERM and the tables/references you bring more than you need to sit behind a monitor, IMO.

tl;dr: An in person class helped me stay motivated, but wasn't required. Work problems and write all over your MERM.

 

[azharuddin0613]

I have failed this time. I spend hell lot of time reviewing merm, crane 410 and practice problem of PPI for TFS. I was sured to clear it but I saw thru diagnostic that I scored only 45 of 80. I felt i was very slow in exam probably needs to do lots of mock exams to speed up. If anybody has ncees practice exam and want to share with us then please do share. I attached my diagnostic please share any suggestions. Thanks

View attachment PE-Mech_Thermal-Apr-2017.pdf

 

[azharuddin0613]

Sorry here is the diagnostic 

View attachment 89682-2017p04examineediagnostic99637813843015926cdd67ee8c.pdf

 

[A Random Guy]

I felt i was very slow in exam probably needs to do lots of mock exams to speed up.

You are probably correct. 95% of my studying was doing NCEES practice exam questions. I kept cycling through them every few weeks until I could fly through most. At home I could do 40 questions in 2:00-2:30. On exam day I finished the morning in 2:45 and afternoon in 2:05. My Texas score is a 92 (not sure what that exactly means, but speculate based on some other posts that I got 6 or 7 wrong). I only used MERM and my thermodynamics book on exam day. I brought Crane 410, fan engineering handbook, fluids book, heat transfer book, and homemade excel steam tables, but never touched any of them during the exam.

 

[Maddog10]

I took Dr. Tom's Fast Track and loved it. The structure of the course and organization of the notebooks made me extremely efficient in working problems. You have to be prepared to put in the work because there is a lot of material covered, but IMO he did a great job of covering exam topics and making it easy to reference the information you need quickly.

 

[RaggedyMan]

I did the School of PE live online course to prepare for the TFS exam, and passed first time in a decoupled state. A few of the instructors knocked it out of the park in terms of reviewing material. Some of the other instructors not so much. I think they struggled with adjusting their classes to reflect the new exam specifications. 

I'm sure that the class was beneficial to my review with the additional problems that we were asked to work during the class. The most useful thing was working the practice exam forwards and backwards. Get a copy of the FE reference manual, I used that more during the exam than my MERM.

I would have self-studied if my company didn't cover the class. 

 

[SmilinEd]

While many people advocate for self-study, you need to look at works for you. I knew I would have a hard time staying disciplined with work and RL, so I took the PPI Online Class with Richard Davis. His notes were great and his knowledge about potential test content was very insightful. The bonus is the PPI class includes all the material you will need for the TFS exam. Personally, I used the following during the actual exam:

• MERM 13th (12th edition would have been fine, just get one and become intimately familiar with it)
  
• Engineering Unit Conversions (came with PPI class, and was extremely useful for the awkward conversions)
  
• Crane TP-410 (while MERM had most if not all of this material, I use this book nearly daily and I am very comfortable with it, thus why I brought it
  

IMHO, Dr Tom's or PPI would be a solid investment. I don't regret paying for the class, as I passed on the first attempt. 

 

[thedawg]

Please, don't take the PPI review course. You'll be throwing your money away. 

Advice - work through practice problems and once you're done WRITE out your procedure to solving that particular problem, any obstacles, unique problems "tricks"/techniques, equations. 

 

[Df H]

I took Dr. Tom's Fast Track and loved it. The structure of the course and organization of the notebooks made me extremely efficient in working problems. You have to be prepared to put in the work because there is a lot of material covered, but IMO he did a great job of covering exam topics and making it easy to reference the information you need quickly.

Can u tell us by detials and steps whitch was your way for preparing?

 

[ME_PE_WANNABE]

I also took Dr. Tom's course, though I did the 20 week course. I passed it the first time up, but felt that I failed after I finished. What Dr. Tom did was simply organizing a study schedule and test taking technique to help us located information more efficiently, which was key to passing the exam. Dr. Tom also offers military/veteran and early bird enrollment discounts for his course; I think paid $795.  One of his best advice was solving the "lowest hanging fruit" questions first ( I know it sounds simple, but it helped me out). 

 

[user 35289]

I took the School of PE course and passed the exam my first time through. I liked being able to ask questions throughout each lesson. The instructors were pretty good for the most part.

I think being in the course was beneficial to understanding what to study, but the most effective use of my time was working example problems and creating "cheat sheets" that explained how to do certain kinds of problems step by step. I bound those pages in a binder and used them to solve 90% of my problems on the exam.