Advice?
We just got our new Stirplate delivered this past week--a very small one. We have the proper stir bar, and when it was delivered, naturally, we took it out and set it up with water to ooh and aah over the cool vortex.
Today I set it up with a starter for the first time. I found it relatively difficult to get the stir bar to attract to the magnet in the base--it seemed rather touchy, but hey, what do I know? This is our first plate. After just a little fiddling, it started nicely enough and kept WLP037 in suspension admirably. This yeast is particularly chunky.
However, I just checked it a few moments ago, and it has stopped.
I looked at the starter in our flask (1000 ml), and located the bar--there it was off to the side. How annoying. So I took the keeper magnet and reset it. Put it back down on the plate, carefully centered...
... and it whirred around. Hooray! Then it promptly got flung off to the side again. The speed was not set to fast--I didn't have a vortex going or anything (I didn't think that was necessary just to keep the yeast in suspension). It was just set to a nice medium speed. I reset the stir bar again, recentered it, adjusted speed up and down and so on. No dice.
Now, this yeast is VERY chunky... but it doesn't seem to me that a stir plate is worth much if it doesn't have the power to move a little bit of chunky yeast, so it must be something I'm doing or not doing. While there's a nice sediment already, keep in mind that it's only been fermenting since this morning. There's not THAT much there.
So... can someone tell me,is there something I'm doing wrong--does anyone have tips? Do I need to turn around three times and spit?
We just got our new Stirplate delivered this past week--a very small one. We have the proper stir bar, and when it was delivered, naturally, we took it out and set it up with water to ooh and aah over the cool vortex.
Today I set it up with a starter for the first time. I found it relatively difficult to get the stir bar to attract to the magnet in the base--it seemed rather touchy, but hey, what do I know? This is our first plate. After just a little fiddling, it started nicely enough and kept WLP037 in suspension admirably. This yeast is particularly chunky.
However, I just checked it a few moments ago, and it has stopped.
I looked at the starter in our flask (1000 ml), and located the bar--there it was off to the side. How annoying. So I took the keeper magnet and reset it. Put it back down on the plate, carefully centered...
... and it whirred around. Hooray! Then it promptly got flung off to the side again. The speed was not set to fast--I didn't have a vortex going or anything (I didn't think that was necessary just to keep the yeast in suspension). It was just set to a nice medium speed. I reset the stir bar again, recentered it, adjusted speed up and down and so on. No dice.
Now, this yeast is VERY chunky... but it doesn't seem to me that a stir plate is worth much if it doesn't have the power to move a little bit of chunky yeast, so it must be something I'm doing or not doing. While there's a nice sediment already, keep in mind that it's only been fermenting since this morning. There's not THAT much there.
So... can someone tell me,is there something I'm doing wrong--does anyone have tips? Do I need to turn around three times and spit?