Kind of confused

CornyKegs 728
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Bixter1

Bixter1

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SO. I havent had a lot of time to get into the whole yeast thing (and I will). I want to do an ESB at around 1.040 SG. Mr Malty says i need 148B cells. I have a smack pack of Wyeast 1318. Could I do anything tonight to get ready to pitch around 5 pm tomorrow? My stirplate came in if that helps...

Either way :mug:
 
Yeah, break that stir plate in and make a starter. Go for about a 1/2 gallon starter, seeing as that isn't that big of a beer.
 
Mine was @ 1.044 . Its more of an ordinary bitter like a Boddington. Just reading my grammar in this thread. THANK GOD being drunk and posting is acceptable here...
 
avidhomebrewer said:
Yeah, break that stir plate in and make a starter. Go for about a 1/2 gallon starter, seeing as that isn't that big of a beer.
Click to expand...

1/2 gallon? That's a bit much. You could get enough cells with about half of that (Mr Malty said 1 liter with a stir plate).
 
I did 1.5 qts for an ESB over the weekend that was 1.055. I don't use a stir plate just intermittent shaking.
 
OK. So I checked on my carboy and there is a solid cake of yeast in the airlock and about 2 inches thick all around the outside of the carboy. it's almost done fermenting so I dont feel too bad but, is this because I pitched too much yeast? Also is there a way to avoid this next time?
 
What size carboy are you fermenting in? How big of a starter did you make? You could always use a blow off tube but a beer of that gravity shouldn't need it.
 
Good question. I believe 5-6 gallons. I forget the exact size! I made a 800ml starter. I will admit there wasn't a whole lot of space left ion the carboy. Probably 1/2 gallon of dead space.
I think since I will be playing with starters that I should go the blow off tube method.
 
Sounds like a 5 gallon carboy to me. Your starter size sounds perfect for that beer. For now get a blow off tube. A 1 inch plastic tube submerged in a bucket of sanitizer would do the trick. In the future I would recommend 6.5 gallon carboys for primary and 5 gallon for secondary. That would give an appropriate amount of head space for most beers except anything over 1.070 or so.
 
Also you'll want to control the fermentation temperature to keep it from overflowing as well. Definitely leave a gallon or two of headspace, 6.5 gallon carboys are great for 5-5.5 gallon batches.

You can also look into fermcap defoamer, which works great for me even though I only put it in the boil, enough gets transferred to the carboy to help there too (but I have a bottom drained system).
 

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