pitching yeast starter at high krausen

I will be brewing this weekend, and I plan on making a starter. If I make my starter on Friday night, will Saturday be too soon to pitch the yeast, even if fermentation is basically peaking?

When I made my last starter, fermentation was peaking after about 24 hours and was done about 24 hours later.

I can wait until Sunday to brew, but I can't wait much longer. unfortunately, I can not make my starter tonight, and after using a starter, I feel like I need to make one if I want my batch to turn out as good as it possibly can.

Thanks for the input.

You can do that -
I usually start my starters a day earlier than that - Thursday afternoon for a Saturday brew. But mine certainly don't finish in 24 hours!

I pitched a 1200ml starter Saturday noon, had a krausen by 3pm - and today is Thursday and it's still bubbling furiously. Constant 64F.

I'll be leaving it 4 weeks, then kegging. I'm a firm believer in patience.

24hr is fine. 16hr is minimum in my opinion, 24hr seems to be good as well, especially if you have a stir plate. If you make a starter on Friday you can have it to pitch on Saturday. Even if you think it needs time to kick off, you can brew Saturday and pitch Sunday.

If you are making a big beer then you really need to worry about the starter being as active as possible. If it is a brew with an OG of less than a 1.070 then 16-24hr will be fine. Heck, my 1.105 OG beer fermented out fine with a 16hr 1.5L stirplate starter.

What is the OG of the beer you are making? I'd be concerned about whether a simple starter is enough or if the starter will need to be stepped up a few times to create enough yeast.

Seven said:

What is the OG of the beer you are making? I'd be concerned about whether a simple starter is enough or if the starter will need to be stepped up a few times to create enough yeast.

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Good question, however unless it is a huge beer there is no real need to step it up.

the og won't be too high, somewhere between 1.045 and 1.050 at most (it's a Hefe), using WLP300. My batch will also be a 4 gallon batch, so I shouldn't need much more than a Liter

Oh, dude, just throw the vial in! I just did a Hefe with WLP300, tossed the vial in without a starter. OG was 1.051, FG was 1.011 after 1 week.

So yeah, if you need to do a starter, then you can make it the day before. I don't do starters for anything below 1.060, and it has worked out fine for me thus far.

You absolutely do not NEED to do a starter - I didn't for years. One vial or smack pack certainly works.

What happens is the yeast have to get busy multiplying, (along with eating sugars) in order to accommodate the vast resources we give them. This is your "lag" time.

A starter bumps that 100 Billion yeast cell count up to 200-300 Billion, or more. Less reproductive work to do once it hits the wort (although still significant) and shorter lag times.

A good write up of starters and what impact they have on your beer can be found at: www.mrmalty.com/starter_faq.php

Remember if you keep things sanitary enough you can have your chilled wort sit for a while and let your starter keep/begin going. I have on occasion made a starter the same day (with a portion of the wort). Let the starter go a few days (as needed to reach your cell count) then aerate your 'main' wort (which should have sat airlocked with no activity those days) and pitch.

I've done this with good results... But for low & medium gravity beers I've also just pitched directly from the vial or packet with good results...