Resources

Unlike every other engineering discipline (Mechanical, Civil, Electrical, Chemical) Petroleum Engineering lacks a good reference manual for the PE Exam. The SPE official resources are:

Society of Petroleum Engineers Textbook Series

Vol. 1, Well Testing, Lee                                                                                                                                                                          

Vol. 2, Applied Drilling Engineering, A. T. Bourgoyne Jr., et al. 

Vol. 3, Waterflooding, G. P. Willhite, et al.

Vol. 4, Theory, Measurement and Interpretation of Well Logs, Z. Bassioni

Vol. 5, Gas Reservoir Engineering, J. Lee, et al.

Vol. 6, Enhanced Oil Recovery, D. W. Green, et al.

Vol. 7, Basic Applied Reservoir Stimulation, T. Ertekin, et al.

Vol. 8, Fundamental Principles of Reservoir Engineering, B. F. Towler

Vol. 9, Pressure Transient Testing, J. Lee, et al.

Vol. 10, Advanced Well Control, D. Watson, et al.

Vol. 11, Streamline Simulation: Theory and Practice, A. Satta-Gupta, et al.

Vol. 12, Fundamentals of Drilling Engineering, R. F. Mitchel, et al.

  

Petroleum Engineering Handbook Series Editor-in-Chief: Larry W. Lake  

Volume I: General Engineering  
Volume II: Drilling Engineering  

Volume III: Facilities and Construction Engineering  
Volume IV: Production Operations Engineering

Volume V: Reservoir Engineering and Petrophysics  
Volume VI: Emerging and Peripheral Technologies

I own all of these books (plus about fifty more petroleum engineering books). Most are not very useful on a timed, open-book exam; no time to flip pages! Remember, ten problems an hour equals only six minutes for each problem. Often it takes several minutes to read/understand a problem. If you waste time looking in hope, you will fail. As I've said before about this exam: if you think, you're dead.

There are only three possible references one could use on the Petroleum PE as a "primary" text. They are below (with links).

1. Petroleum Engineering Handbook (SPE, Bradley)

2. Petroleum Engineering Handbook for the Practicing Engineer (Mian)

3. Winrock PE Review Course (Wines)

I've owned these texts for years. Each is crazy expensive. But I used none of them during the exam. Note you cannot buy the Winrock text; but must take a week-long course to get the text (this course and manual are excellent for education in petroleum engineering and I strongly recommend it., even if not taking the exam).

I know a lot about these three books. Each is tabbed, indexed, highlighted. They were some of my primary texts studied. But I never even opened one during test time. Look, all three are great for learning tools and I strongly recommend each to study from. But for actual use during a 6 minute per problem exam? No way. Were I to take it again, I wouldn't bother to bring them.

So what resources did I use?

1) My own manuscript (or your own notes). This was a concise 130 page summary of about 30 texts. It sat on my desk, spiral bound, always open.

2) SPE Textbook Series Volumes 1, 2, 4, 12.
3) Dictionary of Petroleum Exploration, Drilling & Production.

4) SPE Handbook Series Volumes 3, 6.
5) Update: I forgot to mention Well Control for Completion and Workover (and of course the HES Redbook).

I felt good leaving the exam after the first half. I felt less confident during the second half, but upon reflection understood this was weariness (goofing off the night before and forgetting my NoDoz). 

I made a conscious point to not scan any of my (numerous) resources until the very end of each exam section. Precious time is better spent working, especially checking your work. You either know it, know exactly where to find it (and I mean exactly), or let it go.