EP #141: Concrete Data - How to Spot the BS

Seth Tandett (00:00)
And welcome to another episode of the Concrete Logic podcast. And today I have Dr. John Belkowitz with Intelligent Concrete back on the show. Fan favorite. We were chatting at...

Dr Jon (00:10)
think,

I'm sorry, I think Robert Higgins is the fan favorite. Like, let's just be honest and be fair, sir. I don't mind. Credit where credit is due.

Seth Tandett (00:14)
Yeah

Yeah,

you're probably in the top 10. How's that?

Dr Jon (00:22)
I'll take top 20.

Seth Tandett (00:23)
Okay. Well, anyways, we were just discussing a very interesting topic about how much data is tossed around in our industry, how it's presented, and charts can be stretched, air bars can be missing, which I don't even know what an air bar is till I was talking to John. He's explaining that. We're going to talk about that today.

Dr Jon (00:35)
Oof. Oof.

Wait,

wait, how are you saying it? Air bar or error bar?

Seth Tandett (00:51)
Well, from where I live, it's Airbar.

Dr Jon (00:55)
Just for those out there on, you know, error, there's two Rs and O and an R.

Seth Tandett (00:56)
Error bar, sorry. Sorry, error bars. Is that

like a Taylor Swift album or something? I don't know. Okay, okay. Anyhow, essentially the results are cherry picked and I was explaining to Dr. John as just a regular guy, when I see a chart, I believe that the person that's presenting the chart is just using the data.

Dr Jon (01:06)
Exactly, yes.

Seth Tandett (01:23)
and not necessarily just showing us cherry-picked portions of it. So he's going to share with us today what to look out for. So that's what we're going to look at or talk about today. So that way, when we are presented data or a chart, that we know what to maybe ask questions to the presenter, what to ask for, what to look out for.

is what we're going to talk about today. But before we get started, I wanted to thank Douglas Clark for his donation to the show. He went to the website, www.concretelogicpodcast.com. He hit the donate button and sent a dollar amount that he felt that he got value out of show for. And I appreciate that. And he left the message. He said,

I enjoy the podcast and I appreciate you discussing the topics that are so important to our industry. So I just want to say Douglas, thank you. Appreciate your donation. So that's one way you can help the show. Also don't forget about Concrete Logic Academy, ConcreteLogicAcademy.com. That's another way that you can get.

Dr Jon (02:27)
I

did one of my PDHs through there last week on ethics.

Seth Tandett (02:32)
Yeah, there's a, so if you enjoy the show, the podcast, what you can do is you go to the academy, you can essentially listen to the same kind of format, but we add quizzes to it. So you take a quiz showing that you understand the topic and then we can give you a continuing education credit or professional development hours.

depending on what class you take. that's what that's there for. And then don't forget, too, you can go to the podcast website and reach out and give topic or guest suggestions. If you feel like we are leaning too far to one side and you want to hear the other side of what we're talking about, please reach out. I want to make sure we're fairly balanced. ⁓

Dr Jon (03:21)
I feel like

that's based off of a conversation we had this morning.

Seth Tandett (03:24)
It is and that's I appreciate that the the feedback that I get good and bad good and bad. I do appreciate it ⁓

Dr Jon (03:32)
Hey, if

anybody on the presidential debate committee is listening for you as president, I think Seth would be an amazing moderator. Amazing moderator. Go ahead, bud.

Seth Tandett (03:43)
That's a big jump from just talking about concrete. Anyhow, so let's talk about the topic at hand. again, we want to see, or Dr. John, if you could explain when data is presented to us, be it in just raw data or chart, I guess we should ask who's it?

Dr Jon (03:47)
Isn't?

Seth Tandett (04:03)
Who's it really aimed at? Who's the data for? What are we reading? Maybe can explain what an error bar is. I didn't even know what an error bar is. And maybe when we should ask more questions about the data that we're presenting. Because most of the time when we're presented with information, we're all just trying to

we don't really have enough time, outside of what we do for a living and things that we, know, are taking care of our families and things that we have to do at home. I don't have extra time to really dig into the stuff. And, that's why we bring folks like doctor. Yeah. And we go to conferences. If you can go, if you can afford going, if you get the time to do it, those are two, but I would, that's what I was one of the aims of the podcast is to, to

Dr Jon (04:38)
go to conferences, well, yeah.

Seth Tandett (04:50)
give you all access to this kind of information so that you, so it's more accessible to everyone. so what should we be looking out for when someone presented us data?

Dr Jon (04:53)
Sure.

Sure, so I mean this is it requires you to take a deeper dive looking into data sets and it's really hard because the only time you get to do that is the chance when you either do read a paper or somebody's presenting you data from a university and most of those presentations are squished into 30 minutes. So what you got 30 seconds to a minute and a half to digest the slide. But you know first thing is why do we present data and even though none of us would like to admit it

All of us who work in the construction industry have a little bit of engineer in us.

Yeah, I know, I know, but the definition of an engineer, are you ready for this? You're going to agree with me here in a second, Seth. Are ready? This is why I'm the doctor. The definition of an engineer is a problem solver. Now, would you call yourself a problem solver?

Seth Tandett (05:54)
Yeah, would say my initial direction for my academic career was to be an engineer. And the school quickly found out that I was not to be an engineer in their eyes. know, yeah, that's a different rabbit hole. But yes, I agree with that. I think that anyone that's in construction could be considered an engineer, problem solver.

Dr Jon (06:06)
Why did, how did the school find? This is another discussion, yeah.

I feel like we need to go toilet paper and egg this school on a later conversation. Engineers build their confidence off of data. Data ad nauseum. One of the things that we chew and stew on in the industry is compressive strength. If you go to a concrete mix design, you have to have a certain...

Seth Tandett (06:21)
No, no, that's my fault, not theirs.

Dr Jon (06:41)
factor of safety or overdesign of your concrete mix strength if you don't have more than 12 sets of data or 10, 12 sets of data over a three-year period on that concrete mix design. So instead of having a 5200 PSI mix, now you need to have a 6200 PSI or 6600 PSI mix to hit that 5200 PSI until you get that 12 sets of data and then you can go back to that ASI 214 standard deviation.

So we use data in our industry to build confidence, okay, what we ordered is what we paid for, is what was transported, is what we received, is what we put in our job site and our form work, that's gonna hold the effing building up, whatever type of structure it is. So anytime we're using, I don't know, a new concrete mix, a new practice, a new raw material, a new ad mixture, none of us are confident. We're born saying no to new technology. What gets us

starting to say yes or helps us get to yes is the data. You know, what did the atom mixture do to fresh and hardened properties? How did it do it? One, three, seven, 28, 56, 90, 365, year and a half, two years. There's a test called the G109 that is a 10 year certification. But we use that data to start building the confidence and then we get data in the field. So the reason why people present data

is to create some type of a narrative, a persuasive narrative. Either we need more money for this, you should use this, or this is what happened and why. That's why the first question, why do we present data? So does that make sense? Then our biggest problem is engineers, and we're not presenters. I'm not Joe Rogan, Joseph Rogan.

Seth Tandett (08:22)
Yes, great.

Dr Jon (08:32)
I'm not good at the podcast. I'm not as good as you. What I'm good at is looking at datasets, understanding trends, and more importantly, understanding what to call bullshit. Is this the type of show where can say bullshit? Okay. I won't say bullshit again. So the next question that you have to ask as the audience is who is the presenter?

Seth Tandett (08:45)
You already did. You can't ask after you do it.

Dr Jon (08:59)
And how are you presenting the data? I hate it when people show me a freaking crunch of the data. Don't show me what happened to the data. Show me the data. Does that make sense? Exactly. What is one, and I think I've already said it, what is one data set?

Seth Tandett (09:14)
Yeah, but can you explain more?

Dr Jon (09:23)
that everybody in the concrete and construction industry knows about concrete. One data set that you can pick. Strength. Look how easy that was. Folks, did you hear that? For the Dan McCoys of the world, Daniel Allen McCoys of the world who are listening as they drive. Hi Daniel.

Seth Tandett (09:29)
strength.

Dr Jon (09:39)
that one in the chamber. Is that a fair assessment?

Seth Tandett (09:42)
Yeah, mean, that's everybody goes to that first.

Dr Jon (09:45)
has

we've been raised on compressive strength, right? Like we say strength, doesn't necessarily mean compressive strength, but to us, compressive strength is everything. don't get, it's the easiest thing to get in the concrete industry. you need a little more strength? Throw a half a sack at it. If you go into ACI 318, there's like six or seven equations that convert compressive strength into modulus elasticity, tensile strength, splitting tensile strength.

Like it goes on and on and on. So when we present strength or something, excuse me, when we present an admixture and what it does to concrete, I don't want to see the effing normalized data. I want to see the reference, right? I want to see the compressive strength at seven, 28, 56 days. Could be one, three, seven, 28. Could be 12 hours, one day, four days, seven days.

Seth Tandett (10:32)
Yeah.

Dr Jon (10:43)
Whatever it is, I want to see over time, I want to see a growth or a regression. want to see what happening to the concrete. Right?

Seth Tandett (10:50)
Yeah.

What is normalized? When you normalize data, what is that?

Dr Jon (10:55)
So there's so many different ways of doing it. means you're taking the data and you're dividing it by something. And as concrete producers and as concrete engineers, if we use ACI code, I think it's 214 or ASTMC 94, you use a normalization technique. And what you're supposed to present is cement efficiency at 28 days.

Now what you do in that normalization technique is you take your compressive strength at 28 days and you divide it by your total weight of either cement powder, total cementitious, or binder. Most folks do total cement or total cementitious. So if I've got 5,000 psi at 28 days and I only have 500 pounds of cement, my psi per pound of cement, I've normalized it out to a pound of cement,

is 10 psi per pound of cement. Does that make sense?

Seth Tandett (11:58)
So you take that data and you kind of extrapolate what you want, like if you want. So.

Dr Jon (12:08)
Yeah,

I don't know if extrapolate I would call it you Purdue Pharma Your way through the data you kind of you change up the peaks

Seth Tandett (12:14)
So if you

don't redo the test, you take the results you get, and then you make up the results if you wanted. Like you were saying 500 pounds of cement, and you're like, well, I have that information. So 600 pounds of cement, all I got to do is take the average of the 500 pounds, what it did, and I just add what it would kind of do if I add another 100 pounds.

Dr Jon (12:39)
So, something like that. if I... Let's say if I had a concrete that was making, I don't know, 6,000 psi with only 500 pounds of cement. That means my... I said 6,000, not 600, right? 6,000 psi? Right. That would mean that my cement efficiency is 12 psi per pound.

Seth Tandett (12:53)
Right.

6,000 psi with 500 pounds of cement.

Dr Jon (13:09)
Well, hey man, I only need 10 psi per pound, right? So I'm 20 % greater on what I need to be. So there are ways to use, and the normalizing of strength by cement weight, that has been used for decades and there is a lot that goes into it. It's one of the KPIs for most concrete companies.

Seth Tandett (13:18)
Okay.

Dr Jon (13:34)
Like are we getting, and what it goes back to that normalization is, and this is your audience, the reason why we use that is because we want to communicate and understand are we getting the bang out of our cement, cementitious buck. Cause if I'm using a cement and it's giving me a PSI per pound of seven, as opposed to I can use another company, costs me a little bit more, but I get a 12. Well, what the hell am I doing with this company?

I don't have to use as much dang cement. there's a reason why we... Now, the problem with, you know, trusting people to do... choose their own normalization, like, hey, I'm going to use... Some people use the weight of cement. Some people use the weight of cement compared to the amount of cement that they use, and they use that to normalize out the weight, the value, or...

Seth Tandett (14:03)
Okay. Right.

Dr Jon (14:28)
Some people normalize the value out with the control or the reference, especially if you're adding something to concrete. So if I have a control, my concrete mix, but there's just cement, rock, sand, water, some type of aggregate, and that's it. Then I take that same mix and I add one, two, three, four, five dosages of admixtures. Now what I'm going to do is every time I get a 28-day strength from these five, I'm going to divide it.

by my control. So instead of seeing the strength increase, I see a percent increase. That's called a normalization. Right? We're normalizing it by dividing it out by the control. Now, to me, I call that the Purdue Pharma trick. Right, if you've never seen the Purdue Pharma trick, harsh words for so early in the morning. It's almost lunchtime.

Seth Tandett (15:06)
Okay.

Okay.

Okay, and why do you say that?

Yeah.

Dr Jon (15:25)
Um, well, California, it's early. It's what 8 13 out there. Um, so the Purdue farmer check, if you've never seen the movie, um, and I wouldn't recommend it fantastic movie, but it breaks your fricking heart and it makes you so angry. Um, one of the tricks that the folks at Purdue pharma did is they normalize or excuse me, they didn't normalize out the data. I apologize with their absorption.

of the opiates into the bloodstream, they measured it over a certain timeframe. I think it was like a two hour period. Now with most opiates, there's a spike where the body absorbs it and there's a huge drop off very quickly. If you've ever taken, you know, been to the hospital and had morphine, it lasts about 15, 30 minutes and then you need another fricking, you know, push of the button to relieve pain.

Well, what Purdue Pharma showed was we don't have those peaks in that same time. It's more of a gradual increase and then it dies off. And with that, they got this non-addictive of an opiate because it showed that the bloodstream didn't absorb it as quickly. Right? The problem was people weren't looking at the Y axis. And there's a beautiful part where I think they have the real person, you know, describing what's happening in the chart.

The Y axis is not your standard integer axis that goes from 1 to 10,000, which is the units that are measured for this absorption into the blood. The Purdue Pharma didn't show a standard integer going from 1 to 10,000. What showed is something called a logarithmic scale, where the first 100 units, here I'm going to try to do this on my screen, the first 100 units have the same height.

on the y-axis as the next 999,900 units. So what you end up doing is losing that peak, you end up flattening or creating this false narrative or this curve that helps you develop a false narrative. And that's what people do when they end up normalizing out data. Instead of seeing the peak of compressive strength. Hey, for us,

You know, 25 % increase in stress and compressive strength. Let's take that data. Well, 25 % is not like a quarter. Who gives a shit? 5,000 times 1.25 is 6,250. Right? If you just say, let's say, okay, okay, John, that was a little intense. 25%. That's actually a big fucking increase. Let's chop it in half then. So instead of saying 5,000 PSI, let's say times 1.25.

Seth Tandett (18:04)
Yeah.

Dr Jon (18:12)
or 25 % or quarter, let's say it's half of that, 12.5%. Oops, five, zero, oops, I still did the math wrong.

Seth Tandett (18:21)
So you're

12.5 % to 5,000? Is that what you're doing? Yeah.

Dr Jon (18:26)
Right,

right. That 12 % doesn't look like much, but that's 625 PSI. For some DOTs, if you're short 625 PSI in your compressive strength at 28 or 56 day, you have to rip out and replace the structure.

Those numbers are big, but when you normalize it out with a reference or a percent, you turn it into a percent, it looks a lot smaller. You you reduce those peaks. You normalize out the curve. You plateau it. So our next thing is, who is the audience? I think it's who is the speaker?

You know, how is the data presented? And I've been on an effort and I'm trying to curve my language. That's why I paused.

Seth Tandett (19:15)
Well,

I would say before you go on your rant here, maybe.

Dr Jon (19:19)
I never go on a rant.

Seth Tandett (19:21)
I, through the years, you know, what I've learned is I think everyone has a motivation, right? I have a motivation to do this show. you know, when you listen to, you know, the podcast, you got to remember that I'm motivated to do the show. Why is Seth motivated to do the show? So just like that, you should be asking when someone...

Dr Jon (19:30)
Bing Crosby said advance, yeah.

Seth Tandett (19:46)
you know, like Dr. John or anybody else is presenting you data, you get asked where are they coming from, why are they motivated to tell you the information that they're telling you and presenting you. So you have to keep not saying that everyone has good or bad intentions, right? Not trying to label them. Okay. But I would.

Dr Jon (20:02)
I'll say that.

Seth Tandett (20:05)
Doesn't that make sense though? You need to ask that before you're even like, okay, I'm going to dig into this data. But one of things you got to ask is who is this person? Where are they coming from? What is their motivation?

Dr Jon (20:16)
And it doesn't matter who they are. Like I love colloidal silica, L-O-V-E love it. But my parents also raised me right. What I also love is being honest and telling the truth. And the next topic that we're getting on is what is, what are error bars is a very important topic that

isn't discussed enough is presented, isn't discussed in what people take a look at, answer that question of yours. If you look at the error bars, you kind of get an idea of who the person is presenting the data. And I meant that more in a figurative, not a literal sense. Does that make sense? Okay. So how is the data presented?

Seth Tandett (20:55)
No. Explain.

Dr Jon (21:00)
when the data is normalized or the data that is presented does not show error bars or the person is not willing to talk about their standard deviation or error, or if they present their error and their error is greater than the measured values, you need to call bullshit.

Seth Tandett (21:20)
Or ask questions. don't have to call. So, and I don't, we did, we ⁓ the error bars that we, I don't think we explained what those are. So on a bar chart, you pointed out to me that, well, the ones you showed me and explained to me what it is. So you get, you know, on a bar chart, it looked like an I, like a capital I.

Dr Jon (21:24)
That's what I mean. Ask questions.

scatter plot doesn't matter go ahead

bar chart.

Seth Tandett (21:44)
that was at the top of the chart and explained to me what that bars represents.

Dr Jon (21:50)
Right, do

you have a whiteboard on this thing?

Seth Tandett (21:54)
No, you gotta verbally explain it. Dan McCoy doesn't watch the show, he's listening right now.

Dr Jon (21:56)
Yeah, yeah, that's fine. ⁓

right, right, right. Dang it, Daniel! Get a new vehicle. So when you're presented with data, especially in a bar chart, you're not being shown all the data. The bar chart, the bar itself only goes back to a Y-axis normally that gives you one value. What the one point, let's say it's five, right? Let's go back to 5,000.

Seth Tandett (22:18)
One point, yep.

Because I think it's important to explain that when someone presenting you the data like that, the bar chart, that they didn't do that test once, right? They've done it multiple times. So when someone sees bar chart, they're like, oh, they did that test once, and that was the value they came up with. What you're saying is they've done a bunch of tests.

Dr Jon (22:24)
What

Right? Right.

an average

of three, an average of five, compressive strength, you're supposed to do an average of three. Most people do an average of two or an average of one. Dan, you can't see that one, you buddy? But you should do an average of three because that gives you a good standard deviation. And if you have an F up with one cylinder, you can throw it out. So now you still got an average of two, right?

Seth Tandett (22:45)
Right.

Right.

which we've all probably experienced if you've been on a concrete

job or in the concrete industry long enough, you've had that problem.

Dr Jon (23:15)
So when we present data, let's say compressive strength, we present an average of three samples, right? But when we present that bar, we have, as Seth so beautifully illustrated, we have an I. And it goes up from the average and down from the average, and it has two caps to it. They're called end caps. And those end caps represent the maximum

on the data that we tested or measured, and it represents the minimum on data that we measured. Normally when we're doing evaluations, we'll do anywhere from five samples. And as it turns out, more data equals better science or more accurate science. So what you're hoping that you're doing is getting a more accurate bell curve or spread. Does that make sense?

Seth Tandett (24:08)
Yeah, it does. that the taller that eye is on a bar chart that's showing that the wider the data was received or whatever they came up with,

Dr Jon (24:09)
because you're up.

So, right. for compressive strength, and you don't have to guess what they are. You don't have to, well, it should be, it shouldn't be ACI 39. I have so many ACIs, but the compressive strength ACI, or is it 31, gives you the standard deviation that you're allowed. And I believe it's 3.2 or 3.5%. Let's say it's 3.2 % just for argument's sake. And we have a 5,000 PSI break that has an average that means...

we can only go up to 5160 and down to 4840 psi. If we have two breaks or three breaks that are 5000, we have a fourth that's at 3900.

Right? Or if we have three breaks, one's $3,900, one's $5,200, and the third one's $6,500, what you got is garbage. And you need to evaluate is your person casting the mixed crappy or is something wrong with the machine.

Is it not calibrated? Is it leaking oil while you're using it?

So that has happened. I started working. Yeah, I started working. They not only had their CCRL, they were major ad mixture provider. They had their own freaking laboratory as CCRL certified. And I started, it was one of our first clients. And I remember I started working there and the first thing they showed me, they brought me through the offices, they showed me a manufacturing was, where storage was. was like, screw this, I don't want to see this, I want to go see the lab. They had this old ass, tiniest Olson with one of the...

the captain's wheels on it from the ship. And as they're using it, it's ramping up, you know, in the PSI, you know, it ramps up PSI per, or per PSI per second. You see the freaking red hydraulic oil. What is that? Dot three. Is that what it's called? That red hydraulic oil? Anyway, they had a white vinyl floor. It starts leaking out. The machine is bleeding.

Seth Tandett (26:14)
I'm not sure.

⁓

Dr Jon (26:21)
And what

happened was it ramped up and then when the machine hit pressure, it pushed it out the gasket, it was leaking and the PSI per pound ramped down and it changed what strengths they were getting.

Seth Tandett (26:33)
Yeah.

That's crazy.

Dr Jon (26:37)
So when to call bullshit. First of all, you can't glance at the data. you know, Seth, you said it a little bit ago. I don't have time in my life to read that bullshit. You know, on average, most men spend about eight hours in the bathroom a day. So.

Seth Tandett (27:00)
think that's true. I call BS on that. Yeah. ⁓

Dr Jon (27:01)
It's not true, but hey, I put it on a chart. If I put it on

a chart with no standard deviation, you would fucking believe it. No, you spend a lot of time in the bathroom, risk getting pink eye, bring a paper in there with you. Right. Most of these papers are pretty easy to read, especially when you've cut through the bullshit and you don't have to read the entire paper. The abstract will tell you what's most in the paper. Right. I don't know if anybody knows this when you're looking at data.

Seth Tandett (27:08)
Yeah.

Dr Jon (27:29)
Don't do it the data at the presentation. That data is bullshit. That data is not peer reviewed most of the time. And what that means is, oops, when data is not peer reviewed, that means nobody's checking over it. So for instance, you know, I don't want to show data from a recent presentation that somebody gave, know, Seth said we have to be nice for some reason, but.

When you're presenting, your data, the error bar should not exceed the measured value. What that means is you didn't have a colleague review it. Because a colleague would have said to you, hey dude, you're going to look like an idiot if you present that. Because that means your data is freaking worthless. So reading these papers, they're broken down into four sections really quick, because I can feel Seth wants to shut down the podcast.

Seth Tandett (28:24)
Yeah.

We're getting to that time. People don't have long attention spans.

Dr Jon (28:25)
It... I know, I can smell it.

We've been

doing this for 31 minutes and 15 seconds. it was on Robert Higgins, you would go for an hour and a half. Okay. Little jealousy. Calm down, Belkowitz. It's all right. I know I'm not the favorite. The way a paper is broken down, most of what you need is in one paragraph. It's in the abstract. Right? Then there's an introduction, which is normally a page and a half to two pages. And there are some pretty drawings that tells you the background. And it really is the most interesting part.

Seth Tandett (28:36)
Well, yeah.

Alright, he'll be fine.

Dr Jon (29:01)
After that, there's materials and methods. And it's just telling you type of sand, rock, cement, admixtures, the measurements of those and the equipment they're using, the type of equipment and what standard they're using or what method they're using to measure. Then what it goes into is the raw results or if somebody's being a prick, the normalized results. I don't mind if you show me the raw results and the normalized results. You should speak about both.

but they should go through the results. You can kind of skip the material section and the results section and go straight to the discussion section. The discussion section is where they're going to explain why the results are significant. And then after that, their conclusion section that goes into what this means for the industry. And normally, because they're shaking their can, who I shouldn't have that, they're shaking their can to get change or more money. say,

what do we need to do for future research? And then the last thing is, is they always talk about who has funded the research. And that is really important, you know, going back to what Seth said, know who this person is and who's funding the research, right? If it's being funded, if it's a paper that says, there's nothing wrong with type 1L cement and you can use limestone for heterogenesis.

genius nucleation and it causes pozzolanic reaction and funny enough all the research was supported by the cement industry, a specific cement provider. You know the data is probably leaning to one side. Is that fair?

Seth Tandett (30:38)
I yeah, it is fair.

Dr Jon (30:40)
Okay, and that goes for university. what I'm trying to say is don't be afraid of these fucking things. They're easy to read and they're easy to break down, especially if you've got a red magic marker. And as it turns out,

Seth Tandett (30:42)
Yeah.

Dr Jon (30:53)
A lot of these people who write these papers, they're not as good of writers as you think they are. And the fact that they're getting peer reviewed just means that somebody's checking their paper for bullshit. It might still be bullshit, but yeah, don't be afraid of these papers. They're great. I read at least six of these a week.

Seth Tandett (31:12)
Yeah, yeah, I agree with what you're saying. At the very least, is to ask questions. And I think people are scared to ask questions sometimes because it's going against the, what everybody is.

Dr Jon (31:26)
How

ridiculous does that fucking sound? These are the same people.

Seth Tandett (31:28)
Well, I'm saying you can't, you can't.

I've been, I've been labeled a P, Portland limestone cement hater. Okay. I've been labeled that. Yeah, I don't, I don't. But what, what I guess what I'm getting at is if you question it to me, then I think people think you're against saving the earth. I think that's what people think.

Dr Jon (31:37)
So, they're idiots.

Seth Tandett (31:52)
If you question PLC, you are a guy that doesn't care about the earth and you want to blow all the CO2 in the air, which I don't, what? Yeah.

Dr Jon (32:02)
Whoa, whoa, whoa, slow down, slow down,

slow down. You're not making a political statement when you ask a question. And I'm sorry, Karen, but you don't seem to have a problem with speaking up on a job site when the concrete hasn't showed up. So use that same rhetoric and that same energy to ask your question. And if somebody, if somebody's going to piss on your Cheerios and yell at you for being political,

Seth Tandett (32:09)
No.

Right.

Dr Jon (32:29)
You know what, Seth, and this is for all the other folks out there. I really don't care about the booze because I know who those people cheer for. And if they think they're doing something good for the environment, they should probably look past A6. And I'm not being disrespectful. That's according to ACI code 323. They need to look past the effing gate. Cause whatever has happened with Portland limestone cements, by the way, they're not Portland limestone cements. They're blended cements that happen to have.

limestone in it. So let's get that shit right. It's not Portland limestone because it's not Portland. Shit, the Portland Cement Association even isn't called the Portland Cement Association. They're called the American Cement Association. Why the hell are we calling it Portland Cement? So get off of that soapbox as using that as an excuse for a don't want to ask questions. No, no, no, no, no, no. Once you start asking questions, the dominoes start falling until somebody gets brave enough to step up and say, hey,

He's right. What the F? Like you and for the audience, Seth is really one of the greatest moderators out there to a fault that you sometimes won't call. I say call bullshit and no, you can't invite John cause you can't put a muzzle on him. I'm sorry, but I I'm 48 years old. I'm not going to change. Man. Seth is one of the calmest.

and most level-head guys I've ever met. Like, I don't know how you do it, man. Like you have some of these people on your show that I would have been, bullshit! You're lying. No, that doesn't, there was somebody on your show who said you can put a silicate sealer down. It's not even a fucking sealer. You can put a silicate down and it'll protect your fresh concrete from freeze thaw.

Do you know how much I would have made that... I would not have been nice. I wouldn't be getting any presents from Santa Claus. Not that I get presents from Santa Claus, but Hanukkah Harry would be sending my presents to a freaking penitentiary.

Seth Tandett (34:30)
Well, again, that's why I started this podcast to give everyone a platform. So if you want to come on here and say, I'm wrong, Dr. John's wrong, the guy with the freestyle silicate protector is wrong, come on, man. Bring it, bring it.

Dr Jon (34:45)
It wasn't

freeze thaw, it was, hey, if you just put down some fresh concrete and it's about to be a freeze or a cold snap, put this shit down and it'll protect you from freezing. Sorry, go ahead.

Seth Tandett (34:57)
I gotcha. Well, I'm just inviting people, you know, just because you don't hear that, that certain narrative on this show and you think I wouldn't let you on the show. I want you to come on the show. Let's all talk about it. This is the place to talk about. We're not hiding behind, you know, doors at a conference either where there's only, there's only 20 or 30 people in a room and we can all talk about, but to me, we need to open up and talk about this together.

Dr Jon (35:01)
I

Is that why nobody wants to be a guest?

Seth Tandett (35:26)
this podcast has a decent reach that I think you can talk to a lot of people.

Dr Jon (35:29)
yeah. But

that's why I've only had three guests on my podcast because I'm mean to my guests. even said it one day, Daniel and I were doing a podcast. was on LinkedIn and you typed in, like, we wouldn't be this mean to you on the concrete logic podcast, Like no shit.

Seth Tandett (35:35)
huh.

huh.

And guess what? He came on the show.

Dr Jon (35:51)
I know he did. Hey, hey, before

I forget, there's somebody I need you to have on the podcast. And he's gonna, I think he's gonna retire soon. His name is Peter Taylor. And he wrote the book. You should read his book. Fan effing fantastic book. And I want you to talk about a really specific section. It's called curing concrete. It should be required reading for all concrete construction managers. Page 19.

goes into the chemical composition of cement and what happens when certain compositions change. I would love you to ask him, is that page relevant anymore and what does it mean now that we don't get that information?

Seth Tandett (36:33)
All right, I'll reach out, see if I can get them.

Dr Jon (36:34)
Or

just have him on there because one, he's an amazing writer. He's been at the foundation of our industry. I learned from him when I, most of us learned from him in the concrete mix design. And like you, he's level-headed, easy to fucking talk to. And I think he's got like a Southern African accent. know, Afrikaans, you know, I think that's where he's from. Yeah, he's really.

Seth Tandett (36:55)
cool. Nice. I like South Africans. Rugby.

Dr Jon (37:01)
but you've got to read his book, Curing Concrete. It's fricking awesome. And no spoilers, but at the end, you should cure your concrete.

Seth Tandett (37:09)
All right, with that, let's end the show today. Dr. John, thanks for coming back on. Appreciate it. And until next time, folks, let's keep it concrete.