EP #170: Concrete Silica vs. Silicates: Are You Getting What You Paid For?

Concrete-Adamus (00:00.182)No.Seth (00:01.481)And welcome to another episode of the Concrete Logic Podcast. And today I have Dr. John Belkowitzy's back on the show. And today we're gonna do we're gonna discuss silica versus silicates. Why should we care? They sound almost the same and concrete, they are not. And if you do not understand the difference, you may not understand what is actually happening in the mix.Concrete-Adamus (00:04.835)Yeah.Concrete-Adamus (00:18.51)Why should we care?Seth (00:28.849)on the surface or inside the product you are buying. So Doctor John Belkowitz is gonna help us with that today. And before we get started, reConcrete-Adamus (00:37.58)We're not gonna do the whole intro, are ya? 'Cause we only have like a few minutes.Seth (00:42.925)yeah, I'm gonna do it just because you don't want to. As always, this is how you can support the show. No, they don't because they're not doing it. So I gotta remind everybody to support the show. There's several ways you can help help out. First way is to to to share it with a colleague or coworker. So if you get something out of the show, don't be selfish. Share it with somebody.Concrete-Adamus (00:48.301)Ari everybody knows the deal.Seth (01:10.237)The next way is if you go to the concrete logic podcast dot com website, you can reach out to me in two ways. the first way is click on the ask Seth up at the top. It's an option in the navigation bar there. And email form pops up and in that email I'm looking for a topic or guest suggestions. So tell me what you wanna learn about, who you wanna hear from.the second way you can get a hold of me is on the same homepage. There's a little microphone on there. Click on that and you can leave me a voicemail. same thing, topic or guest suggestions. the next way on the same homepage on concrete logicpodcast dot com, there is a donation button. You click on that, a PayPal page pops up, and you can put any amount you want to. If you get some value out of the show.Send some value back. Whatever value you get. What are you reading there?Concrete-Adamus (02:13.262)a book by Amir Diazel called Pendulum Leon Foucault and the Triumph of Science. It was about a a technician who discovered that the earth was rotating on a tilted axis. Wasn't a scientist, he was just a guy who worked on he's a metalsmith. And he discovered it in his mom's basement and wasn't even paying rent. It is a great book and a great author.Seth (02:26.108)Uh-huh.Seth (02:36.455)Well, sounds like okay. And then yeah, thanks for sharing. the last part you can do to support the show is check out concrete school dot co. You can join the concrete logic academy for free and jump in there and there's some courses and you can ask questions if you got any questions and maybe you will after today, because todayWe're gonna talk about silica versus silicates. So Dr. John Belkowitz, why should we care? What's the about the difference between silica and silicates? Maybe you should tell us what they are again.Concrete-Adamus (03:18.188)You're sure, sure. The difference between the two, it's like cement is to concrete. A silicate is an ingredient used to make a colloidal silica. And for my colloidal silica experts out there, I'm dumbing it down, but it is the raw stock feed and is going to be, in essence, a lot less expensive than our colloidal silicas because it is the raw stock that makes.or silicas. So we start out with a silicate and there are many types, sodium, potassium, lithium, and they go from high salt content to low salt content.Low modulus to high salt modulus. Now, for our efforts, when we're talking about silicates on top of concrete, we're normally talking at a higher ER modulus, like a 2.2 to a 3.2, meaning it has more silicone than salt, but it's still not a colloidal silica. Now, the fastest way to recognize the difference between the two is the pH.Anytime we hit a pH of 10.7, we are no longer a colloidal silica, meaning we no longer have solid silica particles as species suspended in our colloidal suspension.We have solutes in solution, little molecules that have too much salt on them, and that's the problem, that are floating around with silicones. Does that make sense? So it's really that salt to silica ratio that changes.Concrete-Adamus (04:59.341)Now we can see that in our pH and our SDS. Now if our pH is greater than 10.7, you don't have a silica, you have a silicate. And if it's somewhere around a 12.2, you have a very corrosive silicate. You ever see that movie Fight Club? When Brad Pitt kisses Ed Norton's hand and he drops Powder on him?Seth (05:22.128)yeah.Seth (05:29.063)He puts the powder on first, then kisses his hand.Concrete-Adamus (05:31.956)No, that would burn his lips. He kisses his hands first to create moisture. And then he dri Well, it's science. I I didn't mean to be right, but now that you understand the science of it, because he dropped a silicate powder. Can you answer this, Lobby? A silicate powder onto moisture on his hand, and that kicked off the corrosive reaction at very high pH. And the same thing is said for concrete.Seth (05:36.861)You know what? You're right. I got that backwards. No.Concrete-Adamus (05:59.562)You asked before this, why do we care? Yes. Okay. And we only care if something goes bad with the concrete. Now, why do we care it gets separated to two people? The contractor who only has a one-year warranty, and the asset manager who has many year warranty or has to be concerned about it. There are some silicates when used the correct way. What's that?flooring guy that when used the correct way polish slabs concrete that's gonna receive an acid bath let's use as much silicate as possible right let's just get the end product that we need but when you're putting a glue on the surface or when you have something like alkali silica reactivity that's where a high sodium a high potassium environment will cause a lot of issues and what we have found it's not evenIn hospitals, it's also out in the field. Somehow these silicates are getting into concrete mixes out in the field, and they're getting on top of concrete mixes out in the field because they're posing as colloidal silicas. And that's the last reason why I think it should matter. A colloidal silica will cost you somewhere between a really cheap one, $50 a gallon, a really expensive one, thousands of dollars a gallon. And it depends how you're using it.A silicate, a really cheap one will cost you six cents a gallon, and a real expensive one will cost you 60 cents a gallon.Concrete-Adamus (07:48.79)I mean the reason why folks are masquerading silicates as silica's is not for your best interest and it's not because they think it's gonna do a better job. It's because they're trying to make money on your ignorance. A silicate should be less expensive. You knowWe sell a product that goes on the concrete surface, and the cheapest you can get it for is 12.5 cents a square foot. Normally, and it's a colloidal silicon, normally it's a little bit higher than that. 75 cents, it could go up to $2 a square foot. I can't change that. It's colloidal silica, it costs a lot of money to make, but you don't have to use a lot of it. We have silicates that come in with a pH of 12.2 that they're charging the same amount.And they shouldn't be able to charge them a penny. Like it it should be so inexpensive they should be charging per square yard just because of the math. So what does that mean? People are getting away with fraud. I mean that that's everybody else is being nice. Well, it's the performance that matters. No. If there's something that is called colloidal silica, there's a very specific definition by pH, size, so on and so forth.And you know the last part is the worst part. Not only they being fraudulent to the end user, the purchaser, they're being fraudulent to Department of Transportation. And I believe it's the EPA. Because when you get above, I want to say a pH of eleven point three, now you need to sp to s to pay extra money on special permits.Special packaging and special shipping for your liquid. A product that has a pH of 12.2 doesn't just go in a five-gallon bucket and down the road. That's it's the same thing as any other highly corrosive material. It needs all those special things, and that costs more money. So I meanConcrete-Adamus (09:55.542)I guess somebody once told me follow the money. Why do they do that? They're trying to make money off of people's ignorance. And they should be held accountable, but that's they never will be. That doesn't happen in our industry. Not yet. I mean there are sorry, there are SDSs where the PH PH says confidential.Concrete-Adamus (10:19.191)How's that possible?Seth (10:20.594)Yeah. That's not helpful.Concrete-Adamus (10:23.903)It's sh it's not legal. Like you're notSeth (10:26.866)So why are why are the DOTs I assume they're specifying the silica and people are thinking they're buying s no no no no they're the DOT is wanting a silica, right? And what you're saying is folks are selling silicates as silica. So why are they why is DOT sp specifying silica?Concrete-Adamus (10:38.228)Ignorance.Concrete-Adamus (10:55.313)man, I was talking to this Russian lady the other day. And you, some of these people, they want two hours of your time just so you can inflate. And these are the purchasers. You know, the DOTs want two out of your two hours out of your time. They want months out of your time to create a specification. But out of ignorance, they will go to the lowest common bidder.If they're lying and they won't do the checks, they won't use the specifications. Why? They don't have the capacity to do a pH. So they trust what's, you know, written in the fucking excuse me, the short blurb. It's ignorance. Sounds the same and the provider tells them it's a silica. Yeah, yeah, we're one of those. And some people will even go as far and when I say fraudulent, you could say it because not only they say it, but they write it on their technical data sheets.Shoot, Seth, you've had some of these people on your show. Or these providers on your show. It's so common. It's weird to see that folks get away with it. Because I tell ya, the first time somebody files a lawsuit, an EHS lawsuit against one of these companies, the dominoes will crumble. And that's what I'm just being patient for.Seth (11:51.73)Uh-huh.Concrete-Adamus (12:14.302)Right, and by the way, the what is it? The Federal Trade Commission, they take anonymous for all you folks out there, they take anonymous tips now on fraudulent prod products. my dad keeps telling me to stop telling people that.but if you bought a silicate and somebody told you first of all, go check. And I tell you, going to a local lab to get tested, it's not hard. Cost a few hundred bucks. You don't have to do it yourself, but you can buy the equipment on Amazon from Uncle Jeff. Not hard to tell. It's just there's no accountability in our industry. Goose egg.Seth (12:49.468)Right. I guess w what I was getting at, why why are customers asking for a silica? What are they hoping that the silica will do?Concrete-Adamus (12:57.864)Right, durability. there's a lot of problems going on with this lower carbon concrete. You know, there was you know, wasn't a lot of I guess durability studies on the global concrete mix design and the choices that we had with chemicals. It was more about a sedenticiousyou know, durability evaluation. so we we we took too fast of a a step into the low carbon concrete domain with our mixed designs in conjunction with older chemicals. And now what we got is concrete failing. And this is not a I I I mean I guess it's an opinion because that's what my insurance company pays for through intelligent concrete. but it it just happens to be fact.that I'm voicing is my opinion, but there are DOTs all over the nation that are dealing with early failures. And it's not two years, it's two months, three months. So either they're hoping colloidal silica is going to be another tool in their toolbox for new concrete. And you don't even have to go DOT. You can go residential, hospitals, schools. Bob Higgins is a great person to talk to about this, but then also residential construction.You know, we have one residential provider that in 2025 he had over 400 homes that he built, and over 400 driveways and connecting sidewalks all failed. Like concrete spalling, flaking, that was within a summer. Now he had to build the same amount, if not more, in 2026.So and this is rampant across the US. It's, you know, I told a DOT engineer the other day when speaking about their chain of command, like our new common denominator for failures is two to three months. Not two to three years. And his best contractors are coming to him and saying, hey man, this is failing. We did everything we told you to do. What do we do now?Concrete-Adamus (15:00.533)And nobody has answers. Nobody has answers that fall in under their current criteria of what to do, because it's failing so quickly. So yeah, there's a a certain hope that colloidal silica, as well as other materials, I hate to put colloidal silica under that, but there are a number of other shoot, Bob Higgins is working on a number of great technologies that do something with the nasties in our current concrete. I mean he needs to talk about that more. You want to talk about somebody else?He needs to talk about his technologies that he's working on. He doesn't do that enough. But colloidal silica in and on concrete, you know, in the aggregate, in the water. There are many companies that sell these technologies and then they act as tools in the toolbox to get concrete back to where we used to be. And you remember where we used to be with concrete in 2009 through 2019? Because that's the our our that's the peak of our career, right?Seth (15:34.661)Yeah.Seth (15:58.249)Mm-hmm.Concrete-Adamus (15:59.641)Once we put down the concrete, we forgot about it, right? Unless there was a major problem. You just went to the next job site. Like you went back to concrete and said, Hey, I built that. But now I've got store owners, you know, clothing stores, food stores, dry storage, cold storage, wet storage. They're learning about concrete, agricultural folks, battery folks.This has never happened in their career that they had to understand the difference between certain cements and how admixtures work and what happens when the concrete provider pisses up the truck at the batch plant. Our concrete used to be more forgiving. Getting back to what your question was, why are people using coludyl silica? We're trying to get concrete back there.Seth (16:41.757)Mm-hmm.Seth (16:50.959)It so my understanding of chloidal silica is enhancing the the the good product that's left in the cement and enhances it. 'Cause it seems like to me the new s the low carbon cements we're we're cutting cutting down the amount of clinker that's in there in the cement and that's part of the problem. So is chloidal silicaenhancing what's there using Yep. So so so a good way to tell if y y someone tells you you have a silica and it doesn't do that could be a silic silicate. Is thatConcrete-Adamus (17:21.569)totally. Yeah, absolutely. There's there's a aConcrete-Adamus (17:32.935)You know, it could well, I I tell you the first test is the pH. And I will say not all colloidal silicas are created equal. What n neither all silicates. Uh-oh. I think I have to run. so that's really up to B there.Seth (17:39.026)Okay.Seth (17:43.581)Neither are are all cement either too, right? So so Yeah.Concrete-Adamus (18:00.336)That's really up to the you and the manufacturer. What I'm proposing is you know, for this talk, as we said it was only going to be a few minutes, there is a difference between the two, silica and silicate. There is a way to tell the difference, and there's a reason why people are playing on your ignorance of the difference. I think next time we should talk about the different ways colloidal silica impacts the concrete.Seth (18:29.137)Okay, so what is okay. So what do you what do you want folks to take away from this shorter talk today?Concrete-Adamus (18:29.76)Good and bad. Yeah.Concrete-Adamus (18:37.484)don't be played on by your ignorance. If they're trying to convince you it's a colloidal silica, unless they say, here's a certificate of analysis, we had a third party test it, here are the results. but if they're really trying to convince you, that's the first red flag. No, I promise you, there's a special evidence that shows that this is a silica, not a silicate. That just doesn't exist. Silica in the universe doesn't change.Seth (19:06.153)All right. We'll pause the discussion today. Dr. John, thank you for coming back on the show. And folks, until next time, let's keep it concrete.Concrete-Adamus (19:13.46)My pleasure. Thank you, sir.