Yeast Starter

[rude]

Hi I have purchased a wyeast britt 11 at half price its over 6 months old. Smacked it & it took 6 days to puff up on top of the fridge.

I then made a litre wort with 4 grams of hops at roughly 1035 put it into 2 litre flagon & pitched the yeast on friday. Yeast was in a bag, sanitation was good & temps around 22c.

It was bubbling on the weekend fairly slowly & by monday it has stopped with quite a bit of slurry on the bottom.

My previous starter was a coopers sparkling ale stubby steped up to the 1litre flagon & it really bubbled with a good krausen.When I pitched I had a very good result.

This one hardly had a krausen & bubbled quite slow but I had it covered up so maybe I missed it, allso I swirled the starter 6 or so times.

I am trying to get my yeast skills up so I can progress to AG & I am a bit worried that this starter hasnt got enough healthy yeast cells as it behaved a lot less agressively than my previous starter.

Should I just relax & pitch as is.after checking it is 1010 1012

Put in the fridge, decant & add new 1litre 1040 wort .& do another starter or would this be too much yeast.

Put in the fridge , decant & pitch because I was trying to catch it at high krausen & have missed that now.

This is my forth brew after a long break stuffed the 1st up infected the second was very average but my last nut brown wasnt bad so hoping to equal or better with this one.

Youre comments are greatly appreciated

 

[rude]

Hi I have purchased a wyeast britt 11 at half price its over 6 months old. Smacked it & it took 6 days to puff up on top of the fridge.

I then made a litre wort with 4 grams of hops at roughly 1035 put it into 2 litre flagon & pitched the yeast on friday. Yeast was in a bag, sanitation was good & temps around 22c.

It was bubbling on the weekend fairly slowly & by monday it has stopped with quite a bit of slurry on the bottom.

My previous starter was a coopers sparkling ale stubby steped up to the 1litre flagon & it really bubbled with a good krausen.When I pitched I had a very good result.

This one hardly had a krausen & bubbled quite slow but I had it covered up so maybe I missed it, allso I swirled the starter 6 or so times.

I am trying to get my yeast skills up so I can progress to AG & I am a bit worried that this starter hasnt got enough healthy yeast cells as it behaved a lot less agressively than my previous starter.

Should I just relax & pitch as is.after checking it is 1010 1012

Put in the fridge, decant & add new 1litre 1040 wort .& do another starter or would this be too much yeast.

Put in the fridge , decant & pitch because I was trying to catch it at high krausen & have missed that now.

This is my forth brew after a long break stuffed the 1st up infected the second was very average but my last nut brown wasnt bad so hoping to equal or better with this one.

Youre comments are greatly appreciated

sorry the hops were in a bag when making the wort not yeast as I incorrectly wrote. I put this in because it definately is yeast slurry on the bottom.

 

[Doogiechap]

G'day bloke,
There are a number of other parameters that will determine how much yeast is needed to ideally ferment the brew. MrMalty.com
is a handy online brewing calculator which helps to remove some of the guesswork. Krausen size is not necessarily a reliable indicator of a healthy starter and the peak can often be missed due to the small amount of fermentables.
Good luck with your brew !!
Cheers
Doug

 

[Screwtop]

Put in the fridge, decant & add new 1litre 1040 wort .& do another starter or would this be too much yeast.

This would be my call, give it another feed, see if you can improve yeast viability a bit. Put it in the fridge for a day or two. Mix 100g of DME with 1L of water and boil (just) for 10 min and allow to cool to room temp. Take your starter out of the fridge and pour off the beer, leave a little in the bottom so you can swirl the yeast into suspension and tip it into the wort. Shake to aerate and shake every time you pass by until you see activity, should find that this time it will be more active. A hint, take a small torch and look into the wort through the side of the container, a better guage of activity than krausen, a starter that outwardly seems inactive can be going internally berserk (in the words of Elliot Goblet) with bubbles racing up the inside walls of the container. You should have a good amount of viable yeast after another step, again refrigerate to settle out, pour off the beer leaving a little to swirl the yeast into suspension and pitch.

Cheers

Screwy

 

[kabooby]

Another good way to check if it is fermenting is to tilt your starter to the side. That way any C02 bubbles will be concentrated to the highest side and make it easy to see.

I agree with Screwtop. I would add another litre of wort as described to improve viability

Not a real need to add hops to a starter. You are making yeast not beer.

Kabooby :icon_cheers:

 

[rude]

thanks crew will do just that

 

[therook]

Do you need to decant the beer off first before adding the fresh litre of Wort or can you just add it without decanting?

Rook

 

[rude]

Im going to decant as I dont want too much wort. I like to try & pitch at the hieght of fermentation but might change my ways as it is hard to catch & the fridge then decant then pitch seems to give you a bit more time span. Time will tell if this gives me a fast start.