motobrewer

Recipes 

So, formulating a Maibock, going to use Wyeast Bohemian (2124?). OG 1.069

went to mrmalty calculator, and it gave me 6.6 liters using 2 packs.

1. really? 6.6 liters of starter? i don't have the capacity to even to that, unless i start rinsing out some milk cartons. anybody ever do this? seems like a very bad idea.

2. Is that telling me to make 6.6 liters of starter, then just pitch the slurry, or pitch the whole 6.6 liters?

3. Should I step it up to 6.6 liters over the week, or just pitch my activator into 6.6 liters of wort?

4. Two packs? I thought part of the reason to make a starter was to avoid double-pitching. Why two packs?

thanks

IrregularPulse

Recipes 

With simple starter selected and 2 packs I got 1.33 Liter required for 1069. 1 liter if using a stirplate.

1.45 if it's a lager

And how big of a batch

__________________
Tap Room Hobo

I should have stuck to four fingers in Vegas. :o - marubozo

kanzimonson

Recipes 

Lagers need twice as much yeast, not to mention that's a big beer. Your two best options:

1) Brew a lighter lager with the same yeast, harvest the yeast from the primary fermenter, use the "repitched slurry" section of the calculator.

2) Make the 6L starter, let it ferment completely (maybe a week), put it in the fridge and let the yeast floc, decant off the liquid, and just pitch the slurry.

Scimmia

Recipes 

1. Lagers take quite a bit of yeast, so it does seem reasonable for a "simple starter"
2. Either way, I prefer to cold crash and pitch only the slurry
3. It's saying to just pitch the activators into the starter.
4. There's a slider on the bottom that allows you to change how many packs you would use. To get to 1 pack, though, it goes up to a 16.37 liter starter.

This is all for a "simple starter", if you shake it up every once in a while, the size goes down dramatically. Play with that drop down box, and you can see why DIY stirplates are so popular.

kanzimonson

Recipes 

Oh, and I noticed you must have selected "simple starter." I always select "intermittent shaking" which will decrease the size of the starter. Maybe I'm wrong here, but intermittent shaking for me is literally "whenever I think about the yeast starter, I go and shake it." It usually means I shake it at least 5 times a day.

kanzimonson

Recipes 

Maybe I should think my responses through before pressing "post" because I thought of one more thing: If you don't want to pay for 2 packs, you could probably build the starter in two steps - pitch one pack into say 2L, and then 3-4 days later, add another 4L of starter wort.

And as mentioned above, if you shake it a bit you don't have to make as much.

motobrewer

Recipes 

that's wrong, i don't know how you got that

i get the same numbers as scimmia

intermittent shaking did reduce. as did O2 aeration. i don't have a stir-plate....

5 gallons