old yeast, starter, gravity not going down.

demens · 02-10-2012, 02:16 AM

Hi guys,

I ran into a bit of trouble trying to make a yeast starter from some rather old yeast. I made a starter about 3 months ago, did not like how it had a strong sour smell so i ended up not brewing at all. So it stayed in the fridge this whole time and i decided to try it again. At that time this yeast was about 6 months old already. I should probably clarify i'm talking about washed yeast i collected from the last brew. Altogether makes it 9 months i guess.

So i used 200gre of DME for a 2L starter. I saw signs of fermantation, went to sleep. In the morning there was no signs at all, no krausen, nothing. Which was also the same in all the other starters i've made before. I always figures it finishes all it has to do over night. When i shake it up it starts foaming up. So i thought it was done but decided to check the gravity on it.

I poured a small amount of the starter off into a water bottle when i first made it. OG of the "beer" in that bottle was 1030 and its basically the same now, even 1032. the weird thing is that when i 1st put the hydrometer in the tube its at about 1010 and actually stays there for a few seconds before starts slowly rising all the way up to 1032, It take almost 40 seconds for it to get there. Now i haven;'t brewed in a long time but i dont remember that happening like this. I even thought my hydrometer went bad or something. But it read fine in water.

So is my yeast dead? all of it? No chance to wake it up at this point?

What if i used it anyway? What would happen to the beer, would it just not ferment? If so, could i just add new yeast and fix that issue,.Or would that process introduce some off flavors.

Any advice>.

tektonjp · 02-10-2012, 10:16 AM

Um, it had a bad smell a while back and you still kept it? Maybe that was a sign from the brew gods. Unless it was sentimental gift of yeast from Charlie Papazian, you should have chucked it (charlie-chuck, get it?) and pitched new yeast. It's cheap insurance. Pitching 200ml into 2l is a big step as well. Read up on yeast ranching etc before you try again. You'll find it worthwhile.

**Hockeyhunter99** · 02-10-2012, 02:38 PM

Definately toss the yeast. if it isn't working the way you want it to, i would go with something that will work.

**BamaRooster** · 02-10-2012, 03:25 PM

If it were me brewing my beer, I would toss it and go a different route. But I would have tossed months ago when it was smelling bad.

demens · 02-11-2012, 02:46 PM

Toss it it is then. Thanks for the advice guys.