Guide
Seven topics people reliably look for in the wrong section
Seven topics sit somewhere other than where almost everyone looks first: control systems, vibrations, the periodic table, mass and energy balances, open channel hydraulics, HVAC, and materials science. Each misplacement is a reasonable guess, which is exactly why it costs time, and each has a fix you can learn once.
Control systems are not in the electrical section
This is the most expensive one. Control systems live in instrumentation, measurement and control, which sits in the general half of the book, well before the electrical and computer section begins. An electrical candidate who assumes their own section is self-contained will scroll through sixty pages of it and find nothing.
Vibrations are not in the dynamics section
Dynamics covers particle and rigid body motion. Vibration analysis is in the mechanical engineering section at the back, grouped with mechanism kinematics. This one is particularly awkward because the mechanical exam specification puts dynamics, kinematics and vibrations in a single knowledge area, so one exam topic spans two widely separated sections.
The periodic table is in chemistry, not in units and constants
The front of the book holds conversion factors and fundamental constants, which makes it feel like the natural home for a periodic table. It is not there. The periodic table is inside chemistry and biology, roughly a third of the way into the book.
Mass and energy balances are not in the chemical section
The chemical exam specification gives material and energy balances one of its largest question allocations, and chemical candidates naturally look for that in the chemical engineering section. The balances themselves are done from thermodynamics. The chemical section handles reactors, separations, solids and cost.
Open channel hydraulics appears in two places
Fluid mechanics carries the general treatment. The civil section carries its own hydrology and water resources block with more depth on open channel flow, weirs and hydraulic jumps. Neither is wrong, but they are not the same material, and knowing which one you need saves a second lookup.
HVAC appears in two places as well
Thermodynamics closes with refrigeration and HVAC cycles. The mechanical section closes with its own HVAC block. If you want a cycle diagram, go to thermodynamics. If you want load material, go to mechanical.
Materials science has moved
In the current arrangement, materials science sits between dynamics and mechanics of materials. In earlier printings of the tenth edition it sat before statics. If you learned the book on a copy you downloaded a few years ago, this is the relocation most likely to catch you, and it is a good argument for making sure your study copy matches the version your exam will use.
Read next
- The FE Reference Handbook table of contents, explained for the section order these seven sit inside.
- How to find anything in the FE Reference Handbook in under 30 seconds for the routine that stops a wrong first guess costing a minute.
Sections this touches on
Page numbers here are read from handbook version 10.5 (seventh printing, April 2025), which runs to 502 pages. NCEES revises the handbook and page numbers move with it, which is why the drill asks which section a topic lives in rather than which page. Check the version of your own copy, downloaded free from NCEES.