# 1056 first time starter



## JBrew (4/7/13)

Hi all - am in need of some clarification on yeast starter behaviour re the above strain (eventually ill start contributing to this forum rather than just ask for advice).

Tuesday evening
Boiled DME 150ml/1.5L. Cooled and poured in to 3L juice container. Followed with yeast. Vigorously swirled and air locked. Appropriately sanitised everything (hopefully). Temp controlled at 20 deg

Wednesday morning
Good bit of foam on top of boiled extract. No airlock action while standing. Gave a vigorous swirl and airlock went nuts. Wort looks milk shakish.

Wednesday night
Still no airlock action when still. Prob a bit less foam than this morning. Airlock active when swirled. Lots of foam when swirled. Some sediment at bottom. Tried to swirl as often as possible when home from work.

Thurs morning
Even less foam now. Still temp controlled. Still some action on airlock when swirled.

I was expecting the airlock to noticeably be active similar to a brew fermenting. 
Also thinking that maybe the ferment has been and gone given that 1056 is aggressive (see-I've done my research). Might account for the foamyness being at its peak after only 12 hours.

Any thoughts? All normal?

Was hoping to step up with another L of boiled DME tonight so I can pitch 1.5L in to fermenter and split the rest in to bottles for future Ales.

Will be cooking up brew #4 on Sunday and am having a crack at maxibiab and thought I'd go the whole shabang and use liquid yeast. Previous brews all been extract with US05 - all tasty as.

That's my story - and yes I'm bored out of my mind at work today....

Cheers

J


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## verysupple (4/7/13)

All sounds normal to me.

I've never used an airlock for a starter, but it sounds like everything was going along fine and producing CO2, but you never let the levels build up enough to create enough pressure to force itself out through the airlock. The reason it fizzed when you swirled it was that most of the CO2 was in solution, and came out when agitated - all normal.

My advice is to not use an airlock. I use the juice bottle lid so I can shake it _vigorously _as often as possible to agitate and aerate (you've probably read how important oxygen is for yeast growth) and then undo the lid and just leave it sitting loosely on top. This lets CO2 out but stops wild yeast, dust etc. getting in (the nasties can't crawl or anything so if you can keep out the dust that they're hitching a ride on, you keep them out).

Even if it's finished fermenting the first starter, you can still step it up (in fact I'm pretty sure you're supposed to let each step ferment out before starting the next if doing multiple steps, but this is another thing I've never actually done so happy to be corrected).

Happy brewing, JBrew.


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## Dan Pratt (4/7/13)

Hi Jbrew,

Two things for starters -


dont bother with the airlock for a starter ( as mentioned above ) - I use alfoil and other use foam, either option should be sanitized (starsan is great for this, IMO)
invest in a stirplate and elenmyer flask - for $100 bucks you will have 2 peices of long term equipment that will be used every brew.
The yeast is an important step for making better beer. If you can get it well oxygentated/aerated while making the starter a typical 1.2lt will create the required yeast within 36hrs or less using a stirplate ( all depending on stirplate speed, yeast viability, gravity of wort, temp etc etc etc)

No affiliation but check out these guys for the gear -

http://www.digitalhomebrew.com/p/64/digital-stirplate-or-magnetic-stirrer-for-homebrewers

I tried making a cheap one and as with most things ended up buying the right product.

Good luck


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## Yob (4/7/13)

Ive got a 1056 starter just calming down now (1lt on the stir plate linked above), it went off, so much so that it knocked the al foil lid off  caught it before it made a mess though..

there was a chart around somewhere which showed the difference between a starter on a stir plate and a simple shake starter.. it was this that got me over the line into a better stir plate..

no affiliation, but those digital stir plates linked above rock :beerbang:


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## JBrew (4/7/13)

Thanks for the reply guys.... Will def get on to that stir plate.

Will see how the step up goes... Keen to split the starter and save some coin.


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## lael (4/7/13)

Yob said:


> Ive got a 1056 starter just calming down now (1lt on the stir plate linked above), it went off, so much so that it knocked the al foil lid off  caught it before it made a mess though..
> 
> there was a chart around somewhere which showed the difference between a starter on a stir plate and a simple shake starter.. it was this that got me over the line into a better stir plate..
> 
> no affiliation, but those digital stir plates linked above rock :beerbang:


that is some serious krausen! What was your pitching amount of yeast? ed: in what size erlenmeyer?


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## Yob (4/7/13)

that went into the starter? a dollop of slurry that I had in the fridge... a dollop _*is *_a technical term h34r:


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## lael (4/7/13)

haha, awesome. 1 Ltr flask?


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## Yob (4/7/13)

In this particular case yes it was, I'm generally using a 2lt flask though.


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