this post was submitted on 10 Feb 2026
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Thank you for mentioning this. I'm imagining it would also be caught when they test the mix if it was anywhere near dangerous, but if not, someone doing this as a prank or what not could really hurt a lot of people. My brother is a concrete worker, and their injuries are severe in even minor mishaps. I know he tests the truck when it shows up to make sure they delivered the right mix for the job. Concrete seems very well study and specced out. I always hear this is a major hurdle when someone invents a new low-carbon method of making cement. Because of the danger and liability of so much weight falling down on people, safety people are averse to tinkering with a proven formula for a job.
My quick searching also showed about 1% by weight was roughly where it would need to be to prevent setting, 0.1% would just delay setting by around 7 hours. This would also probably only be a "useful" tip if it was enough to mess up a truck load, which seems to be around 20 tons, so if your 30 pounds/ton is correct, our saboteur would be standing there pouring sugar for quite a bit.
I don't even think sugar would really show up in the test most people do before a pour. It's not really going to change the viscosity of the mix, which is what most testing is done for in big pours. It's just going to set slowly, which happens sometimes anyways depending on temp and weather.
All of this is kinda a moot point because you'd have to actually add all the sugar to the mixer for it to be effective.....and if you have access to the mixing truck, it'd be a hell of a lot easier and safer to just add the sugar to the truck's fuel tank.
Large projects also involve casting tests as well. When you do a pour, you also cast a few cylindrical molds of concrete. Then, you test those cylinders after a few weeks.
If your goal is to safely sabatoge a project, something that causes an issue here seems like a good option. It will get caught before it becomes a safety issue; but after it has already cost a significant amount of time and resources
Ahh, yeah my experience is more oriented to residential construction back when I was going to school. For that stuff you were lucky if anyone did a slump test.
I would still be uneasy about doing this to a commercial space in my state at least. It wouldn't surprise me if a construction company attempted to place a bribe to a lab or more likely a local official if it was cheaper than digging out a bad slab.
get to the inspector. become the inspector. cause the project to be built in a way that it will fail. the inspector is the easiest point of failure. cause cost overruns because of safety. be creative.
it's the
version of sabotage
Makes sense on the testing, I suppose there aren't too many people out there purposely screwing with a mix. I've tried to get more in depth answers from my bro when things like this come up, but the last thing he wants to talk about outside of work is more concrete, so I appreciate you explaining these things.