Standard Handbook for Civil Engineers (Handbook)

Generalle well-written and easy to follow. Useful as a supplemental study reference for the Civil PE Exam.

Could use a good bibliography.


Great Review/Reference Book   October 23, 2001
Kevin A. Straight (Los Angeles, CA)
6 out of 6 found this review helpful

I'm a senior in CE this year and I have been using the 2nd edition of this book (1976) more or less daily as I work on my senior design projects. Not really in depth on any one subject, but its great if you just need to look up a formula or technique that you forgot from some class. I plan to ask for the new edition as a graduation present.


excelent and good reference   January 30, 2005
Pejman Shojaeion (Iran , Tehran)
2 out of 3 found this review helpful

I found it most complete reference for civil engineers ,I always carry this book in my travels ,I found it complete in this fields: safety and health concerns, and the most current codes changes including ACI, AISC, ASTM,
and you find powerfull data in covers systems design, community and regional planning, the latest design methods for buildings, airports, highways, tunnels and bridges. It includes sections

what do you want else ,buy it and carry all knowlege you can have.


A civil engineer's review - this book is a good buy   July 23, 1999
34 out of 37 found this review helpful

The Standard Handbook for Civil Engineers is a comprehensive single volume book. This book is divided into 23 sections covering entire gamut of civil engineering. In first few chapters it deals with design management, specifications etc. These chapters are quite informative. It also describes various construction materials in a lucid form. But the chapter on structural theory should have more elaborately presented. Many aspects of advanced structures such as plate, shell etc. are not discussed. Finite element method is almost untouched. This book does not contain too many numerical examples. Rather it tells you how to take decision. For example, it tells you how to choose structural system for multistory building, but does not tell how to analyze the same. Geo-technical engineering section is also little bit concise. Concrete design section is good but a number of worked out problems would have made it better. Same goes for steel design section. Surveying was featured in very lackadaisically. Building engineering section is well written with very good general descriptions. Transportation, water resource and environment parts are also well covered. Coastal engineering is just touched. In overall this book is a good buy. But this book won't be much useful to all because it is written only in American code. What I dislike most about this book is that it is not written in metric units.