Preparing for the FS exam
330 practice questions, every one with a worked solution
Written for this site across all 7 subject areas of the Fundamentals of Surveying exam. Every distractor corresponds to a specific, real mistake — the wrong trigonometric function, the wrong foot, a station computed as PI + T — and the solution names it, so a wrong answer teaches you something.
Every question is free right now.
By subject area
330 questions- MathematicsThe algebra, geometry and trigonometry that every other domain assumes — right triangles, the law of sines and cosines, coordinate geometry, areas and volumes.
- Basic sciencesPhysics and applied science a surveyor meets in the field: light and EDM, temperature and tension effects on a tape, statics, hydrology basics and units.
- Geomatics fundamentalsInstruments, field procedures and the data that comes off them: levels, total stations, differential levelling, traverse field work, notes and data reduction.
- Plane surveyingThe computational heart of the exam: traverse computation and adjustment, area, curves both horizontal and vertical, earthwork, and construction staking.
- Geodesy & GNSSDatums, coordinate systems and satellite positioning: the ellipsoid and the geoid, NAD 83 and NAVD 88 and their modernized successors, State Plane, and how GNSS observations are made and processed.
- Boundary conceptsGeneric, nationally applicable boundary principles — the PLSS as described in the BLM Manual of Surveying Instructions, the hierarchy of calls, retracement, riparian concepts and record research. No state-specific statutes.
- Measurement analysisError theory as an exam actually tests it: systematic versus random error, standard deviation, propagation through sums and products, weights, and closure tolerances.
Measurement analysis
The error-theory drill
Standard deviation, standard error of the mean, propagation through sums and products, weighted means, and closure against a stated tolerance — the four ideas that make up almost the whole measurement-analysis subject area, drilled on their own.
What is in the bank, and what is not
Every question here is original and was written for this site. Nothing is taken from, or modelled on, the reference material supplied during the exam itself — that document belongs to the exam provider, and reproducing it would be both unlawful and useless, since you will have it on screen anyway.
What a practice bank can do is rehearse the arithmetic until it is automatic and expose the handful of mistakes that account for most lost marks. Those mistakes are the same every year: mixing the two feet, using degrees where the formula wants radians, computing the PT from the PI instead of from the PC, dividing by n instead of n − 1, and adding random errors linearly instead of in quadrature.
Boundary questions are deliberately generic. Boundary law varies by jurisdiction and this site does not attempt to teach any state's statutes; what is tested here is the nationally applicable material — the Public Land Survey System as the Bureau of Land Management's Manual of Surveying Instructions describes it, the commonly taught ordering of conflicting title elements, and proportionate measurement.