3rd Time Brewing, No Yeast Action

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oach

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Hey All,

It has been almost 48 hours with no action going on in the fermenter of my third beer. I know this might be a little early to worry, but I use Nottingham dry yeast since it neutral (I will start exploring the complexities of yeast soon) and a quick starter and fermenter.

There are obviously many reasons why this could be but my brew day went the same as any other and I used the same yeast I used in the past. The only difference was boiling the cup of water before I put the yeast in (yes, I let it cool to 90 degrees before adding the yeast) per John Palmer's book in the yeast section on dry yeast. I usually just place the yeast in hot water from the tap, no boiling.

Usually the yeast "bubbles" up when placed in water before pitching, this time it just sank to the bottom and has done the same in the carboy.

Is this set of yeast screwed and should I pick up another packet of yeast tonight?

Thank you for your time and help.
 
Good Pt. it could be the 'not to be trusted' airlock... I've never had yeast take more than 12 hours to get going but these guys are WAY more experienced than me so I gladly yield!

I dunno, he said he proofed it and it didn't bloom.

Have you checked your thermometer for accuracy? Maybe you killed it with the boiled/cooled water.
 
That's kinda why I just tossed out the possibility of a re-pitch. Nottingham is fairly inexpensive - I guess wait another day or so and if nothing repitch... but Revvy's point is quite valid, how does he know it's not fermenting. The answer there for me would be to check the temperature first, has it risen due to any possible heat of fermentation. Second I suppose I would (dread) open the fermenter and look for signs of fermentation, maybe even take a gravity reading if I already had the sucker open. Obviously the scary part is talking over 2 day old sweet wort and exposing it to the open room.
 
I actually can't see anything happening like I usually do, which includes seeing the yeast moving in the wort. To the best I can see it is all part of the trub on the bottom.

I didn't put the yeast into the carboy until the water was 72 degrees in terms of the water that the yeast was in. At the time the water in the carboy was 75.

Before I left for work this morning I did shake the crap out of the carboy hoping to get the yeast in suspension and hungry. ;)

Any other ideas? I am going to pick up a pack of yeast for sure on the way home tonight.
 
Did you rock your carboy back and forth BEFORE adding yeast to your wort? When you put your wort into your carboy and its cooled down and your all finished... just rock your carboy back and forth for a few minutes to get oxygen back into your wort. Then add your yeast to it.

I'm not pro... but i've done 2 batches so far and I've seen active signs of fermentation within a couple of hours, definitely after 24 hours I see a lot. Maybe all brews are different... but I'm just giving you my experience on the two I've done so far!
 
I'm not pro... but i've done 2 batches so far and I've seen active signs of fermentation within a couple of hours, definitely after 24 hours I see a lot. Maybe all brews are different... but I'm just giving you my experience on the two I've done so far!

Just because you may have never had something happen before on your beers, doesn't mean that the yeast are doing anything wrong. It just means that you haven't experienced one of the infinite NORMAL behaviors that living organisms, living wildcards, are capable of.

you can't compare one brew to another. No two fermentations are ever exactly the same.

When we are dealing with living creatures, there is a wild card factor in play..Just like with other animals, including humans...No two behave the same.

You can split a batch in half put them in 2 identical carboys, and pitch equal amounts of yeast from the same starter...and have them act completely differently...for some reason on a subatomic level...think about it...yeasties are small...1 degree difference in temp to us, could be a 50 degree difference to them...one fermenter can be a couple degrees warmer because it's closer to a vent all the way across the room and the yeasties take off...

Someone, Grinder I think posted a pic once of 2 carboys touching each other, and one one of the carboys the krausen had formed only on the side that touched the other carboy...probably reacting to the heat of the first fermentation....but it was like symbiotic or something...

With living micro-organisms there is always a wildcard factor in play...and yet the yeast rarely lets us down. So it is best just to rdwhahb and trust that they know to what they are doing.

Don't assume the worst with the yeast, realize that they've been making beer since long before our great great great grandfather copped his first buzz from a 40 of mickey's out back of the highschool, so they are the experts.

Yeasts are like teenagers, swmbos, and humans in general, they have their own individual way of doing things.

For example, I brewed my belgian wit on dec 27th, only this time instead of pitching on the saison cake I used a large starter of bottle harvested hoegaarden.

It ended up with a thick two inch krausen on it.


Guess what, after over 2 weeks, I still have the huge krausen. I took a reading on Saturday and it is at 1.009, so it's done, but that krausen is hanging on.

The hydro sample tasted awesome though.

You just can't assume something based on what you see or don't see, or think something is wrong just because it acts "different" from other fermentations. :mug:
 
That's what I have done to. I aerate the wort as best as I can so that the yeast has some oxygen to work with.
 
Revvy, thank you for the input. That makes me feel better. Hopefully the yeast will be going as expected when I get home.
 
I had a notty not bloom once it just sank to the bottom and it never started I waited a 3 days on the fourth I pitched a new rehydrated pack took off in about 7 hours . If the yeast does nothing when you hydrate it then its suspect to say the least.
 
My HBS guy always makes fun of Notty but I suspect it is because he really wants to sell the WPL or WY... I have had good success with it as have tons of other folks in here.

I'm hoping maybe the 66 is just a bit too cold for it to ramp up quick and perhaps in the next 24 hours you get activity.

I also agree that the yeast have been doing their job for millions of years, probably billions and it knows what to do. I have faith in the yeast. You know there is a but coming... sorry, but they are living organisms and as such can be killed. So in the infinite possibilities at least one has to be that they are kaput. I hope not :) But, it could be...
 
I had a notty not bloom once it just sank to the bottom and it never started I waited a 3 days on the fourth I pitched a new rehydrated pack took off in about 7 hours . If the yeast does nothing when you hydrate it then its suspect to say the least.

I used notty for the first time on saturday and was startled when I went into the room an hour after pitching and it was gurgling away.
 
I think I am losing it :)

aubrey, what did you do to rehydrate your yeast. Please put step by step to see if I messed something up. Also, did yours all drop our did it sort of "bubble" up at the top?
 
I did exactly what it says on the back of the package with the added step of first boiling the water:

1: boil a few cups of water
2: pour 100ml (4oz) into a container
3: cool to 90* F
4: once to 90 (stir to make sure its completely to 90) sanitize the yeast package and cut open.
5: Pour contents of yeast package into water. Do not stir.
6: Wait 15 minutes
7: Should see some slight bubbling by now
8: Stir yeast into the water to fully saturate
9: let sit until ready to use. The longer it sits the more it will foam up
10: pour yeast into wort
11: pour a little more of the water into the container that had your yeast, swirl around and dump into carboy, to make sure you get every last little yeasty friend.

If the yeast don't at least bubble a little when you put them in the warm water, they're either dead, or in shock. Its called "proofing" because you're "proving" the yeast are viable by rehydrating and looking for signs of life. Wherever you got the yeast from should replace the package, especially since its only $1.50 a package.
 
I guess I am not as far off my rocker as I first thought. That's exactly what I did and all the yeast did was fall to the bottom during the first 15 minutes it was in the water. My other two times I brewed it worked fine but now it is giving me fits.
 
Gives me a date of June 2011 so that should be fine. I do know they recalled a batch several months ago, this is not one of them. Just gets me thinking.
 
Just took a gravity reading. It is just about the same from when I put it in. A point or two difference I would imagine comes from the temp difference in the basement versus after cooling the wort (64 basement, 75 cooled wort) but that is it at most.

I went and looked at the reading a couple more times carefully and I don't think there was any change at all.

Might be time for some US-05 yeast???
 
Original Gravity 1.058
Gravity Now: 1.058

I am getting ready to leave for the better part of six hours. Should I just bring the carboy upstairs and leave it while I am gone? Also, should I give it a good shake or will carrying it upstairs be good enough?
 
Original Gravity 1.058
Gravity Now: 1.058

I am getting ready to leave for the better part of six hours. Should I just bring the carboy upstairs and leave it while I am gone? Also, should I give it a good shake or will carrying it upstairs be good enough?

You carrying it upstairs will shake it enough. Do that and go get some us-05. But for god sakes be careful with that carboy, use a milk crate or something.
 
Well a friend of mine came over on Tuesday night with some yeast he had made a starter from a previous batch. We pitched and by yesterday morning it was humming away. So all seems well including the wonderful smell of the hops :)

Thank you all for your advice and time. It is appreciated and I won't be using Nottingham anymore.
 
I wouldn't not use nottingham because of this. Its a great yeast. My Centennial Blonde I just did took off in about an hour, and reached my target FG (1.008) in less than 2 days using it.
 
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