Wyeast smack pack yeast starter

Hey all,

I'm planning on making a brew with a 1.073 OG and decided to make a yeast starter as I've never done this before and have heard that this is a great way to get your cell count up. I looked up how much yeast I need with the Mr. Malty's calculator. I'll be using Wyeast American Ale (1056).

My question is how long do I let the bag swell up before I add it to my starter? I saw a YouTube video on Northern Brewer's page where they smacked the pack before they added it to the starter, but I don't know how long before they added it. Does this matter? Is it necessary?

Any and all help would be much appreciated. Thank you!

Waiting for it to swell up is not necessary when making a starter. The smack pack is just some yeast nutrients and the swelling helps to show that the yeast is viable.

Since you are making a starter this is the real way to tell how viable your yeast are. I usually use Wyeast since that is what my LHBS carries, I just wait about an hour after breaking the smack pack and it works great for me. Although if you wanted to you could probably do it immediately.

i don't think the time that it swells up is as important as making sure that the yeast is at room temp/close to wort/starter temp when you pitch it

since you are dumping it all in anyways the yeast will still get the little bit of nutrient thats in the inner bladder but as stated above its mainly to test viability to make sure the yeast are still alive

i take mine out of the fridge right before i start the boil for the starter and smack it to let it swell while it warms up

It's as simple as that!

Thanks guys!

Terrapinj makes a good point here......it is a good idea to let the yeast warm up first to avoid temp shock.

As for Dirty Polock, he prefers to pitch before swelling and has no trouble with it......I would like to point out that this is not a good practice IMO (especially for a newbie). Here's why. Not only does the swelling prove that the yeast is viable.....it also allows the yeast to regain activity in a sterile environment free from contamination. This means that when the yeast is finally dumped into the starter you know three things for sure.....the yeast is alive, the yeast is free from contamination and the yeast is active and ready to colonize the yeast starter before any bacterial contamination has a chance to set in. There are alot of practices out there that people get by with.....but I prefer to always use thought out methods that are designed to help eliminate chances of error. That's not to say that once you have a process down and you know your system well enough that you can't cut a corner here or there. But on the average, if you stick to a good conservative plan you will brew more consistently and will be less likely to ruin a batch.

I smack my packs the night before starter. (12-16 hours usually before pitching) Why not? Its no extra trouble.

Hope this helps without offending anyone.

Cheers

From the horse's mouth.

From the Wyeast FAQ website:

3. Does the package need to be fully swollen before pitching?

No, The package can be pitched before activating, or at anytime during the activation process. The activation process "jump starts" the culture's metabolism, minimizing the lag phase.

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You don't even really have to smack if you don't want to if you are making a starter, but you definitely don't need to wait for it to inflate. It sound's like you need to be making a decent sized starter, so that's the time you need to factor for, not whether it needs to be smacked or not.

Revvy said:

It sound's like you need to be making a decent sized starter, so that's the time you need to factor for, not whether it needs to be smacked or not.

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Gotcha.

According to Mr. Malty, I need to make a 3.33 liter starter in order to get the appropriate cell count with the 1.073 OG. I could also opt to use 2 smack packs and make a 1.34 liter starter. That makes sense, right?

Hey guys, I'll chime in with progress from my brewday yesterday. I didn't have time to wait for my Pacman smackpack to swell and I pitched into a 1L starter and let it sit on a stirplate for 18 hours or so. I've had a slow starting fermentation so far (very little activity in the last 17-18 hours - as opposed to a Safale US05 batch that has completely taken off in the same time period (10g batch split). I did smack it...just didn't wait the prescribed 3 hours before pitching (into a starter).

My smackpack was a little old though. I'm guessing that's the reason for the slow start to the fermentation. How long do smackpacks typically last? I figured there'd still be some viable yeast if the pack had been refridgerated the entire time.

I'm heading home for lunch today, which will be around 24 hours since I pitched my Pacman starter, and I'll report back what (if any) progress has been made with that specific batch. Last I checked, this morning, there was only a very thin layer of bubbles (can't tell if it's krauzen or leftover bubbles from the oxygenation) at the top.

Update from previous post - finally some krauzen is starting to build after 24 hours. I'm guessing I should've given it more time on the stirplate to re-activate the old yeast.