Survey: time spent studying and your result

[bmwNick]

I thought this would be interesting, to see how much time other people spent studying compared to me, and if they passed or not. I know time spent studying isnt an exact science, but for me I just estimated my weekly hours spent times how many weeks I studied for. Simply post your:

Hours spent studying/If you passed or failed/Your PE discipline.

Heres mine:

100/pass/electrical

 

[Owism]

I think hours are highly inaccurate guage at the level of preparedness needed for the exam but its the only one I guess. There were days when I ran around trying to figure out one problem but that much time was well worth it. 

Just a tip to studyers, dont get stuck on how much time you dedicated. Take as much as is needed to gain full understanding of what you dont know. TAB everything. Cheatsheet formulas and organize them. Take and retake practice exams. Take a few days off one week before the exam to take full 8 hour practice exams and actually using your references so you get in the zone

My rough estimate hours : 4hours x 5 days x 15 weeks = 300 hours . Mostly doing practice problems and looking up what I dont know and organizing everything Along with taking school of PE course for a second time. Probably times by 2 if you include all hours I studied for the October 2016 which i failed

 

[A Random Guy]

My situation is a little weird. I started studying for the Machine Design version of the Mech exam and probably spent about 80 hours total on that. Then the week before I registered for the exam, I changed my mind and decided to do Thermal/Fluids (since that is were most of my work experience has been). I estimate 120-150 hours studying. That vast majority was running through practice exams over and over until I knew exactly what pages I needed for specific types of problems. I wanted to get my average down to about 3-4 minutes per problem (which I met during exam day at ~ 3.5 minutes per problem).

So using the high end of total study time: 230/Pass/Mechanical

 

[kpalframan]

I started studying in early January.  I'd say about 2-3 hours per weekday and 6-8 hours per weekend day.  That equates to about 400 if you account for days where I was completely burnt out and didn't do anything besides feel guilty for not studying.  

I may have over-done it, but I felt good about my performance on the exam so waiting on the results wasn't too bad.  Also, I had been out of undergrad for 8 years so I had to re-learn a lot of the material.

 

[trackerjacker]

I took the environmental exam and passed, first try.  I wish I tracked the hours I studied but I didn't so I really don't know.  I could be off, but I would guess I worked problems for maybe 50-80 hours, including the entire day before the exam (took the day off work).  I also did the NC State online courses, which lists 18 hours total time.  I watched several at 1.5x normal speed though since the instructors talked pretty slowly (especially the Mercer University guy).  

I'd really recommend the NC state course thing.  I've been out of school forever and the EERM book is so daunting that it was really difficult to make myself sit down and just read that book and work the problems, so beginning with the online courses instead was just what I needed to kick things off.

 

[lanette259]

Work was kind and paid for a PPI course, which admittedly I did not attend all of. It started in Jan and ended 2 weeks before the test. Was Tuesday evenings for 3 hours and Saturday mornings for 3 hours, hard to do with a toddler and disabled husband. I studied the notes from the course, watched the lectures I thought would help the most, heavily relied on the manual they send, referred to my basic college text books, and the practice exams. Definitely studied more and harder the closer I got to it. Overall, 140 ish hours? Best thing I did was take the week off of work before the test and locked myself in the guest room and worked problems for 8-10 hours a day.

 

[Broncineer]

2nd attempt overall. Passed Transpo this time around, failed WRE first time.

I took the online Testmasters course. Outside of watching the videos and working the problems given in the materials, I didn't do much additional studying.

All told, I probably studied for about 100 hours total, of which at least a good 10 hours of that was tabbing my references. Possibly more.

 

[txjennah PE]

1st attempt, 60 - 80 hours?  Failed, so definitely putting in the 300 hours second time around.

 

[RockyTop PE]

Over 350 hours over 4 months plus the EET review class.  Passed Civil - WRE on first attempt.  Studying was miserable, but after taking the exam I'm glad I studied that much.

 

[jp11282014]

• Started early January and took the week off prior to the exam (Total of 14 weeks)
  
• Spent about 2-3 hours each weeknight after the kids were in bed and maybe 4 hours each weekend for total of around 200-250 hours. Definitely skipped an occasional weeknight
  
• Didn't take a course 
  
• Passed Civil-Structural on first attempt
  

 

[Lattimer]

About 40 hours, pass, civil construction

I'm a bit odd though, as I was fairly fresh off the FE

 

[SteveTheEngineer]

Zero.  I spent a few hours the day before the exam printing and organizing references.  I did leaf through a practice exam a few months ago but didn't actually do any of it. 

Oh, and I passed (first attempt).

 

[Peeks PE]

There is only one fact that matters. Study as much as you need to.

You will never regret spending extra hours needed to pass the exam, but you most definitely will regret NOT studying more if you fail.

 

[WolfeC]

Started mid Feb. Did test masters. 2 hours weekdays on test master days it was 9 so total about : 294-300 hours, Passed first time, Mechanical: Thermo Heats/Fluids

other factors, I took the FE 2 years ago and graduated 5 years ago. So, nothing was especially fresh.

 

[FLGAEngineer]

School of PE - 80 Hours

Independent - 20 hours (guess)

Getting to know material and tabbing/indexing - 10-15 hours (very important IMO)

Pass Civil Construction - 1st attempt.

 

[J_MEC]

Mechanical Machine Design, studied for around 150 - 200 hours.

I passed  arty-smiley-048:

 

[CivilNY]

150 hours or so and passed first time

80 hours lectures - EET

50 hours practice problems - EET

8 hours practice exam - EET

12 hours review manuals/binders (the week leading up to exam)

 

[thebert010]

Took the Civil Structural in NC.  I took about a week or 2 in January to organize and gather study materials; I only used the CERM, SERM, the specified Codes, NCEES practice tests, and Williams structural depth practice problems.  Then starting in February I put in at least 1 hour each weeknight of studying and at least 4 hours per day on the weekend.  That was broken up into 5 weeks for depth studying, 3 to 4 weeks for breadth studying, 1 week to take a practice test  (broke it up into 2 - 4 hr timed exams), grade, and correct errors, then 1 free week before the exam to relax and organize materials for exam day.  This put me in the neighborhood of 120/140 hours which thankfully was enough to pass on the first try.

 

[gpoli111]

70 hours/Pass/Structural

 

[gpoli111]

Zero.  I spent a few hours the day before the exam printing and organizing references.  I did leaf through a practice exam a few months ago but didn't actually do any of it. 

Oh, and I passed (first attempt).

Cool story bro