PE exam - October 2011

[JagdishRawat]

Hello all:

I recently came to know about this forum while searching for the tips on PE exam in metallurgical engineering. I have following questions for this exam -

1) Is anyone taking the exam in October 2011?
2) Is it really tough exam?
3) Historically, passing rate is between 50% to 65%. Is it because that it is a tough exam or because examinees take it lightly?
4) Is Transport Phenomenon still part of the exam? If yes, which book will you recommend? Does it come with solution manual?
5) I am going through the chapter on casting, forging, machining etc. Do i have to know the positives and negatives of different methods e.g. drawbacks of open die forging and/or types of hammer used in forging etc?

Thanks for your time.

Met1CO

 

[salmon2]

met1co?getting to know your own strength and be able to judge quickly a question in PE exam are part of exam I believe even though I don't take PE yet but I have taken a lot of exams in my life as I have one bs, two ms and one phd. So what I am saying when you see a similar question during exam, you should either skip it or quickly come up with an estimate, and then move on to other relatively easier ones. Save them for later comeback if you still have time. This way, you can maximize your chance to pass.

 

[HSCMIE1]

Met1CO...Have you managed to locate a copy of the solutions manual to Dieter? What I wouldn't give for a copy...

 

[JagdishRawat]

HSCMIE1:

No, i could not find any. There were few links on file sharing website but i am not sure if it is legal. Those website asks you for registration or pay for registration

I also contacted Emeritus Prof Dieter. But he did not reply back.

Is there something i can help in solving the problem?

 

[HSCMIE1]

The problem I'm having is getting my answers correlate with the selected answers in the back of the book. If you would like, we can correspond with Q and A type things via email. That way we can hopefully help each other out (unless you would rather do it via message board). Send me an email at jwhopkins21@hotmail.com if you want to do with this.

 

[EdStainless]

One thing to keep in mind is that simple strength of material, statics, and dynamics problems can be made to look very difficult by providing way too much information. Look above at the Al degas question. You don't need to solve for reactions, it is a flow question.
And yes, 15-20 min per question will be common.

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
Plymouth Tube

 

[mrfailure]

I have twice tried and failed at taking the Metallurgy & Material PE exam under the new format.

The main pitfall that I see is that the exam covers too much territory compared with other disciplines. For example, materials engineers who work in steelmaking utilize different knowledge sets then engineers who specialize in mechanical testing or in forensic lab investigations. The old format used to account for this because graders gave partial credit for knowledge you have but the new multiple choice format is absolute. Since our discipline is not very popular, we do not have some of the resources other disciplines have (like Civil or Mechanical Engineering) to prepare - just a too short guide issued by TMS.

Studying your old text books may help but they will be of limited help if you never used the principles in practice after graduation. The material in the test really is best suited to scientists and graduates with advanced degrees who did more work with the fundamental principles. I am part of a group of working engineers, however, who find the test daunting because so much of it was never germane to me as a practicing engineer.

Good luck! And BTW: I may need my head examined but I'm also going to give it one more try this fall.

 

[JagdishRawat]

I agree that the scope for the exam is HUGE. One can not learn everything and can not retain everything.

But, one thing i can say about this exam - It is making me read or re-read those chapters where i paid little to no attention during my undergrad.

And, it is very enjoyable. It is fun to read these books thinking that i am making by bread and butter because of these books. Although, i do not use them on daily basis but this exam is giving me a medium to pay my homage to these books. I am glad that we have exams like these in existence.

Were you able to study a minimum of 300 hours for this exam during your attempts? Did you solve an infinite number of problems?

 

[mrfailure]

No, I could not put in 300 hours before, but I do plan to approach this differently this time. This has become a personal challenge.

Wish TMS would expand the study guide to about 200 questions - many topics are not covered at all...

 

[JagdishRawat]

It will be great if you can answer some of my questions as you are the only one who as the latest experience with this exam.

1) What is the difference between AM and PM session?
2) Were questions plug-n'-chug type?
3) Were questions plug-n'-chug type but more like each question is made up of 6 or 7 questions? E.g. I have written a questions above from TP book on Al degassing by bubbling N2 and Cl2. This question is easy but it is made up of 5 or 6 questions. And it is very time consuming.

Thanks

 

[mrfailure]

Answers to your questions:

1. As far as materials goes, there is no difference anymore between AM and PM questions. Subject matter is randomly distributed among the 80 questions.

2. Many questions are qualitative in nature that require just understanding how a material behaves. However, there are quite a number of questions which are calculational. They tend to be complex in nature. These questions include a number of red herrings and sometimes have hidden unit conversions.

3. I understand this was true of the old test but I think all of the questions I've seen are all stand-alone and are not based on previous questions.

 

[JagdishRawat]

Thanks you.

1. Now, i understand that subject matter is randomly distributed among the 80 questions. What about the complexity? Can we say that AM session is easier in terms of complexity than PM session?

2. Red herring and hidden unit conversion....lol....This exam is gonna be fun.

Was/Is TMS study guide a better representation of the actual exam in terms of complexity of the questions?

On an average each question gets 6 minutes to solve. Are the actual exam question solvable in 6 minutes? Or is it like some questions can be solved in seconds and other might take 15 minutes?

Thanks a lot for your valuable feed back. It is very hard to find feed backs from people who recently took the exam. Most of the time, these people leave without writing down their insights on the exam.

 

[mrfailure]

There really is no difference between sessions. By the nature of the questions, I recall the first time I took it the morning was much harder for me, but I know this is just the random nature.

I figured I would approach the exam by breaking it up into sets of 10-question 1-hour segments. Answer what I know then come back to figure out the more challenging questions. If everything is answered within the hour then you can go back to earlier session segments.

 

[JagdishRawat]

It is so frustrating that there is no solution manual available for Dieter and Hertzberg. Hertzberg is a good book but it does not have the answers at the end of the book like Dieter has.

It is sad.

 

[JagdishRawat]

Hello folks:

Could anyone please help me out in solving the problem # 11-8 on Dieter. Few lines from the problem statement are -

"A cylindrical steel pressure vessel with a yield strength of 360 MPa is subjected to hoop stress of 140 MPa. A tensile residual stress of 80 MPa also can be assumed to be present....."

Thanks

Met1CO

 

[JagdishRawat]

Attached is the problem statement for the prob 11-8 in Dieter.

Thanks

 

[TERIO]

Your attachment doesn't seem to be working for me and my copy of Dieter is at the office (and could be a different edition anyway).

 

[JagdishRawat]

A cylindrical steel pressure vessel with a yield strength of 360 MPa is subjected to hoop stress of 140 MPa. A tensile residual stress of 80 MPa also can be assumed to be present. The lowest service temperature of the vessel will be - 25 C (minus 25 Celsius), under which condition K1C (fracture toughness) = 1400 MPa.sqrt(mm). The vessel will be designed according to a leak before break philosophy in which a detectable leak will occur before brittle fracture could occur. Determine the thickness of the pressure vessel based on the fracture mechanics consideration.

Answer to this problem is 10.5 mm

 

[JagdishRawat]

Subject:- Moody diagram in the Poirier/Geiger TP book.

This diagram can be found on Page # 80. It is Figure 3.2.

Is this Moody diagram wrong?

I was trying to solve a TP problem from my FE book. I was looking for the friction factor for Re value of 310000. The Poirier book says that it is 0.0037 but the FE book's Moody diagram says that it is 0.014.

I searched for Moody diagram online and found that f = 0.014 for Re = 310000.

Is this Moody diagram given in Poirier book wrong or i am missing something?

Thanks

Met1CO

 

[mrfailure]

METCO1

Question 3 in the TMS Sample questions book has me bamboozled. I cannot figure out why the mean chart for Sample 2 would be out of control. Do you have any idea why?

Aaron Tanzer

http://www.lehightesting.com

 

[JagdishRawat]

For Sample # 2 -

Average for the mean chart = 23.5 (you can read it on the y axis of the mean chart).

Average for the range chart = 0.6 (you can read it on the y axis of the range chart)

UCL for the mean chart = Average of the means + (A2*mean of R chart).

and

LCL for the mean chart = Average of the means - (A2*mean of R chart).

Now, if we can find the value for the constant A2, we should be able to calculate the UCL and LCL for the mean chart. The factor A2 depends on the sample size. In this problem the sample size is 4. Therefore, A2 is 0.729. You can find the value of A2 in tables given at the end of the books related to statistics.

Hence,

UCL = 23.5 + (0.729*0.6)= 23.9

and

LCL = 23.5 - (0.729*0.6)= 23.1


So, we have found the UCL and LCL for the mean chart.

Now, if you look at the mean chart, you can easily identify 5 or 6 points outside the UCL and LCL ranges.

That is why the mean chart for sample # 2 is out of control.

Mean and Range Charts for sample # 1 are in control.
Range Chart for sample # 2 is in control.

To call a process in 'control' both the(mean and range) charts should be in control.

Hope it helps.