New brewer need a little advice

I I brewed a lawnmower ale extract kit from Austin home brew. It's only my 3rd time to brew I followed instructions exactly. As of now which is about 19 hrs in Carboy I see just tiny amounts of fermentation. Temp is 71F. Yeast was a Wyeast smack pack. It was smacked about 5 hrs before I pitched. Should I be a little worried or just no big deal?

Check gravity and see if fermentation is going on. Also, last two wyeast smack packs I have received from Austin home brew failed to do anything. Had to get new yeast for each one. I have since switched to white labs vials and haven't had a problem, yet.

No worries fermentation may take 48 to 72 hours to start.

If it was a 5 gallon batch using just one smack pack is not pitching the ideal amount of yeast. This may also be contributing to the time lag. The beer will ferment but may produce some slight off flavors.

Read up on making yeast starters. mrmalty.com and yeastcalc.com are 2 good sources of information.

is their a Karusen if so you ahve nothoing to worry about. Bubbles in the air lock are not a good sign of fermentation. Let it ride for a week or so and then take a gravity reading that will let you know if it fermentation has taken place.

It's no big deal. A lag time of 24-48 hours is quite common.

For future purposes, you should consider doing a starter. About a day or two before you brew, boil a half cup light DME in 2 cups water for 15 minutes, then let it cool. You will want a half-gallon wine jug or a growler. After the wort is cooled, put it in the growler with your yeast. Aerate it really well, then give it a shake every time you walk by it. This will give you a nice healthy start to your fermentation.

Just my two cents, but if you are doing a simple ale of sorts and nothing yeast specific, switch to dry yeast. I have had ZERO problems since i switched to mainly using safale 05. Love it. Just toss it on top of the wort and keep it at a pleasant temperature and it will treat you well. But ya, you have that lag time because you didnt make a starter. Good luck on future brewing endeavors.

Ok. Thanks for the reply's. I don't have a way to check the gravity.... I will soon. However. I will let it ride another 48+ hours Should my next step be to re pitch, aerate, dump? I had planned on making a starter this time. But I just wanted to get it going. I will next time

Checked before going to sleep and lots of active fermentation! Got a little ahead of myself. Using the Carboy for the first time I was really excited to see something going on in there. Well it going on now!

Great to hear. Hope it's deelish.

dodeebryan said:

Ok. Thanks for the reply's. I don't have a way to check the gravity.... I will soon. However. I will let it ride another 48+ hours Should my next step be to re pitch, aerate, dump? I had planned on making a starter this time. But I just wanted to get it going. I will next time

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Glad to hear that your fermentation is progressing.

I suggest getting a hydrometer soon. After fermentation starts, which you already had evidenced by the small krausen that you saw, you don't want to aerate. Also, never rush to dump a beer. Even ones that you think have gone south may turn out to be good with more time.

kh54s10 said:

Glad to hear that your fermentation is progressing.

I suggest getting a hydrometer soon. After fermentation starts, which you already had evidenced by the small krausen that you saw, you don't want to aerate. Also, never rush to dump a beer. Even ones that you think have gone south may turn out to be good with more time.

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+1 to this. There are a lot of similar threads on HBT of brewers concerned because they can't see any sign of fermentation. It is very important to remember that there is only one way to tell if fermentation is occurring: that is by changes in specific gravity. Don't rely on bubbles in your airlock, visible krausen, etc. Unless you have supervision that allows you to see things on a microscopic level, let your hydrometer guide you.

It is rarely necessary to repitch yeast this early in the process, or worse, dump your beer.

FYI, if you are using a carboy, you may also want a wine thief to draw samples.

Thanks for all the advice.... One more question: This is the first batch I've brewed where I added hops of any kind to the boil or added hops at all. The hops were pellets. Should these have been filtered out before adding wort to primary? Didn't say in the instructions. So I just dumped em in.

dodeebryan said:

Thanks for all the advice.... One more question: This is the first batch I've brewed where I added hops of any kind to the boil or added hops at all. The hops were pellets. Should these have been filtered out before adding wort to primary? Didn't say in the instructions. So I just dumped em in.

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Some people strain their wort, some don't. It doesn't matter either way. I don't have a practical way to strain my pellet hops out, so they go into the fermenter except for the really thick sludge I may have on the bottom after chilling.