Practice questions mapped to all 11 knowledge areas on the NCEES PE Civil Construction depth exam. Figure-based questions with worked explanations referencing ACI 347, OSHA 29 CFR 1926, ASCE 37-14, and the NCEES PE Reference Handbook.
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Per ACI 347, the maximum lateral pressure of concrete on a wall form is p = Cw × Cc × (150 + 9,000R/T), where R is the rate of placement (ft/h) and T is the concrete temperature (°F). For a wall form with R = 5 ft/h, T = 70°F, Cw = 1.0, and Cc = 1.0, the maximum lateral pressure is most nearly:
A construction project has five activities. Activity A (4 days) and Activity B (6 days) can start immediately. Activity C (3 days) depends on A. Activity D (2 days) depends on B. Activity E (5 days) depends on both C and D. The project duration and total float for Activity A are, respectively:
A highway embankment requires 10,000 compacted cubic yards (CCY) of fill. The borrow material has a shrinkage factor of 15%. The volume of bank cubic yards (BCY) that must be excavated from the borrow pit is most nearly:
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Continue practicing for freePE Civil — Construction is a CBT exam of 80 questions over 9h appointment (8h exam time).
11 practice areas in the PE Civil: Construction question bank, each with its own questions and analytics.
Every question in the bank is written in one of these formats.
The PE Civil: Construction exam is the NCEES licensing exam for engineers on the contractor and construction-management side of a project, and for owners' field teams. Candidates take it after the FE and, in most states, after four years of progressive engineering experience. Since April 2024 it has been one of five discipline-specific PE Civil exams. NCEES removed the breadth section once shared with Geotechnical, Structural, Transportation, and Water Resources and Environmental candidates, and all 80 questions now come from the Construction specification.
That specification is unusual among the civil disciplines in how much of it is quantitative site work: earthwork and mass haul, quantity take-off and cost estimating, CPM scheduling and earned value, equipment productivity, quality control of concrete, soils, asphalt, and welded connections, temporary structures such as formwork and shoring, and the OSHA and MUTCD rules that govern the site. The soil mechanics, material properties, structural mechanics, and hydraulics areas are still there, but they are asked as a contractor meets them: a trench, a reshoring tower, a dewatering plan, a haul road. The practice bank on this page follows the eleven topic areas below.
Source: NCEES PE Civil: Construction exam specifications (effective April 2024)
| Knowledge area | What it covers |
|---|---|
| Soil Mechanics | Index properties and classification, compaction and moisture-density relationships, shear strength, effective stress, and settlement as they govern excavation, embankment, dewatering, and trench support. |
| Site Layout and Development | Construction surveying and layout, cut-and-fill and mass-haul analysis, borrow and shrinkage/swell, site grading and drainage, and erosion and sediment control. |
| Material Properties | Properties of soils, concrete, steel, asphalt, and timber that drive construction decisions: mix proportioning, curing, strength gain, and workability. |
| Estimating Quantities and Costs | Quantity take-offs, unit-cost and productivity-based estimating, equipment ownership and operating costs, crew costs, and cost engineering for bids and change orders. |
| Project Planning and Scheduling | Critical path method, precedence networks, float, resource leveling, time–cost trade-offs, schedule compression, and progress and earned-value measurement. |
| Material, Production, and Execution Quality Control | Concrete slump, air content, temperature, and cylinder testing; compaction testing and acceptance; hot-mix asphalt production and placement; welding and bolting inspection; and statistical acceptance methods. |
| Structural Mechanics | Loads, shear and moment, stresses, deflection, and buckling, the basis for checking members, connections, bracing, and the temporary structures a contractor designs. |
| Hydraulics and Hydrology | Runoff estimation, open-channel and pipe flow, dewatering, and drainage and erosion control during construction. |
| Construction Operations and Methods | Equipment selection and productivity, cycle times for earthmoving and hauling, crane and lifting operations, deep foundations and drilling, concrete placement, and construction of pavements and utilities. |
| Design for Support of Construction Loads | Formwork and falsework with their shoring and reshoring, scaffolds, temporary bracing of walls, cofferdams and excavation support, and crane and equipment loads on structures. |
| Health and Safety | OSHA construction standards (29 CFR 1926): excavation and trench protection, fall protection, cranes and rigging, confined spaces, and temporary traffic control per the MUTCD. |
NCEES publishes the approximate number of questions per topic area in the current specification. Download the PDF from ncees.org for the allocation on your form. There is no separate breadth section. All 80 questions are scored as one exam against this specification.
The Construction exam is reported as pass or fail. NCEES converts your raw score to a scaled score and compares it with a standard set by a panel of licensed construction engineers for each form. No passing percentage is published, and the number of correct answers required can vary slightly between forms. Results post to your MyNCEES account, usually within 7 to 10 days, and are forwarded to your state board. If you fail, the result includes a diagnostic report by topic area.
Questions are mostly four-option multiple choice, with alternative item types (multiple-correct, point-and-click on a figure or network diagram, drag-and-drop ordering, and numeric fill-in-the-blank) throughout. There is no penalty for wrong answers. Eight hours for 80 questions gives an average of 6 minutes each.
NCEES does not publish a study-hour recommendation. Candidates commonly aim for 200 to 300 hours. The 14-week plan below fits that into 14 to 20 hours a week and begins with the two procedural areas (estimating and scheduling), which reward drilling until the method is automatic.
Construction questions are built from the mistakes contractors actually make on paper. The item writer takes the correct answer and derives the distractors from a crew rate applied per worker instead of per crew, a bank volume hauled as loose, an overtime multiplier applied to every hour of the shift, a total float reported where free float was asked, or a critical path that skips a lag. PassExams explains, on every tier, why the option you picked was tempting. On Pro, each wrong option is also labelled with its trap type (unit conversion, off-by-one, partial solution, scope confusion, plug-and-chug), so a miss tells you whether the slip was in the units, the network, the rate, or the rule.
The labels build a profile over time. Learning that Project Planning and Scheduling costs you off-by-ones while Estimating Quantities and Costs costs you unit conversions tells you what to fix in a way that an overall percentage cannot. The variant engine rebuilds a missed question with new durations or new quantities so the second attempt tests the procedure and not your memory, and hints remove the most tempting distractor first. Learn the method and the exam's numbers stop mattering. Memorize the answers and the exam will simply change them.
Study the eleven topic areas the current specification lists, because since April 2024 all 80 questions come from Construction alone and the old breadth section is gone. Drill estimating and scheduling until take-offs, float, earned value, and equipment productivity are automatic by the textbook method, since the exam wants that method and not the shortcuts your projects use. Practise looking provisions up in the on-screen PDFs of ACI 347, ASCE 37, OSHA 29 CFR Part 1926, and the MUTCD, because nothing printed comes in with you. Watch the productivity units, and check whether the question asked for total float or free float.
80 questions, all from the Construction specification, delivered in two sections with one scheduled break. Since April 2024 there is no breadth section shared with the other civil disciplines. Every question counts equally and there is no penalty for wrong answers.
NCEES replaced the breadth-plus-depth format with five discipline-specific exams: Construction, Geotechnical, Structural, Transportation, and Water Resources and Environmental. Each has its own 80-question specification, and the standards it lists are now supplied on screen during the exam.
The appointment is 9 hours: a 2-minute nondisclosure agreement, an 8-minute tutorial, 8 hours of exam time, and a 50-minute scheduled break. That works out to about 6 minutes per question.
The NCEES PE Civil Reference Handbook and the standards named in the Construction specification (ACI 347R and SP-4, ASCE 37, the AISC Steel Construction Manual, the PCA concrete mixtures manual, the masonry wall bracing standard, OSHA 29 CFR 1903 and 1926, and MUTCD Part 6) are supplied on screen as searchable PDFs. You cannot bring your own books or notes. Check ncees.org for the current list and editions.
Yes. Health and Safety is a topic area in its own right. Its questions draw on OSHA 29 CFR Part 1926 (excavations, fall protection, cranes, confined spaces) and on MUTCD temporary traffic control, with the standards on screen.
NCEES does not publish a passing percentage. The exam is scored pass/fail on a scaled basis with a cut score set by a standard-setting panel, so it can vary slightly between forms. Consistent accuracy above 70% on realistic timed practice is a sensible working target.
Choose the exam that matches the work you do. Construction suits engineers on the contractor or construction-management side who deal with estimates, schedules, earthwork, temporary structures, and site safety.
Yes. NCEES allows one attempt per quarterly testing window and a maximum of three attempts in any 12-month period. The diagnostic report that comes with a failing result shows performance by topic area so you can target the retake.
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