OK, firstly i will apologise in advance for my lack of knowledge and urgency in this department but I am just beginning to use liquid yeasts, and I have run out of beer (except a double batch fermenting at present).
Im going camping tomorrow and will be back home thursday arvo. I
am planning on doing MUST DO a brew on the following sunday and will be using a wyeast smack pack 1275. It will be a 44 L batch. After reading this thread I want to split the wyeast pack into 4 (store 3 and use 1 in a starter stepping up from 250 ml to 500 ml to 2 L over the 4 days from thurs to sunday (hopefully pitch late Sun night or Mon morning.
The production date on the wyeast pack is April 26 2010
I have been using the pitch rate calculator on the wyeast site
http://www.wyeastlab.com/hb_pitchrate.cfm
and Mr Malty
http://www.mrmalty.com/calc/calc.html
On the wyeast site it tells me I need about 6 million yeast cells per ml of beer (44 L and 1049 OG) which equates to about 264 billion cells required. When I punch in the numbers into the wyeast pitch rate calc it tells me that by using 0.25 of an activator pack and and a 0.5 gallon starter with a stir plate I will end up with 3.2 million cells / ml, about half what I need. If i use the whole activator pack I end up with about 7 million/ ml.
Using the Mr malty calc I punch in the date it tells me my yeast is about 45% viable. I put in the rest of the numbers and it comes out telling me that I need 3 packs or vials and a starter of 2.3 L.
I have a few questions
1. Is the final cell count for a 2 L starter more when you use more of smack pack to start? I was assuming that the end result would be the same but it would take less time with more of the smack pack used??
2. Approx how long would it take to step up to a 2 L starter and have it finished with using 1/4 of a smack pack? (Im contemplating taking the smack pack to my parents and giving dad instructions to activate it on Tuesday on my behalf) - I can here him now, "what do you worry about this s@#t for, I never worry about this when I brew" (K & K man my dad).
3. Am I on the right track with this? if not could you please redirect me,
Thanks in advance for any advice :icon_chickcheers: