Help me understand just what happened

Hello. Long time troller, occasional poster, first thread.

About a month and a half ago I brewed Yooper's dogfish head clone (extract). Pitched my yeast which I saved from the remnants of 2 Dead Guy Bombers. So, I assume it's pacman yeast; though I don't know for sure. I had made a 1/2 liter starter that was really bubbling away when I pitched. OG was 1.070.

Firmentation had taken off and in about a week and seemed to have stopped. I waited 2 more weeks then racked to secondary and dry hopped.

5 days later, racked to keg and took FG. 1.060. Christ..........

Made another 1/2 liter starter with the other probably Pacman yeast, let it ferment out and stepped up to a 1 liter. This nearly overflowed with Krausen it was going so well. I let it ferment out, put it in the fridge for a day then decanted and pitched the slurry.

A few hours later it looked to have the beginnings of fermentation......then......nothing.

I waited another week and a half just to be sure.......1.060. At that point I just decided to dry hop again (about half of the first dry hop) and was just going to deal with it and hope it turns out drinkable.

Now, 6 days into the 2nd dry hop...........it's bubbling again........going absolutly ape tits over here. I mean, seriously???

What the hell just happened.

Oh before you ask temps were between 66-70 (mostly 68). Now it's 64. Could that be it??

Just throwing out ideas...

6 days into dry hop and bubbling again - leads me to believe theres now an infection. Lot of handling of the wort, increased chances of infection.

Possible the yeast weren't upto the job? You wouldn't think that wouldn't be a problem with the repitch but makes you wonder if there is something else lacking the yeast need in your wort.

Less possible but - chances you misread the hydrometer? No change even after a repitch is suspect.


Interseting quandry...

Couple of observations:

Half liter starter -- does that mean a half liter of slurry, or a half liter of liquid? Mr. Malty suggests a 3.4 liter starter, or 123 ml of slurry. You mentioned the starter was "really bubbling away" when you pitched it. This means the yeast were not done multiplying (correct me if I'm wrong).

I think your problem might be seriously underpitching yeast. I'm thinking that adding your dry hops and the onset of fermentation might just be coincidental. You underpitched the first batch, then racked to secondary, which lost most of your yeast. You underpitched again, then a week (or so) later the yeast have finally multiplied enough to start up again. Just happens to be after you dry hopped.

Either that or your hydrometer is just screwed up. Which could happen. Might want to borrow another one to see if you get the same readings.

HomerJR said:

Couple of observations:

Half liter starter -- does that mean a half liter of slurry, or a half liter of liquid? Mr. Malty suggests a 3.4 liter starter, or 123 ml of slurry. You mentioned the starter was "really bubbling away" when you pitched it. This means the yeast were not done multiplying (correct me if I'm wrong).

I think your problem might be seriously underpitching yeast. I'm thinking that adding your dry hops and the onset of fermentation might just be coincidental. You underpitched the first batch, then racked to secondary, which lost most of your yeast. You underpitched again, then a week (or so) later the yeast have finally multiplied enough to start up again. Just happens to be after you dry hopped.

Either that or your hydrometer is just screwed up. Which could happen. Might want to borrow another one to see if you get the same readings.

Click to expand...

There are people here who, although not ideal, pitch a single tube of liquid yeast instead of making a starter. YOu should at least get something. I second trying a different hydrometer although i couldn't imagine it'd be messed up to the point of not registering any change what so ever.

Was this an extract or AG recipe? if AG what were your mash temps?

I'm curious if the gravity has dropped yet. If, as the OP says, it's "going absolutely ape tits", then you should see a SG drop in a 24 hour period.

Chuck_Swillery said:

Just throwing out ideas...

6 days into dry hop and bubbling again - leads me to believe theres now an infection. Lot of handling of the wort, increased chances of infection.

Possible the yeast weren't upto the job? You wouldn't think that wouldn't be a problem with the repitch but makes you wonder if there is something else lacking the yeast need in your wort.

Less possible but - chances you misread the hydrometer? No change even after a repitch is suspect.


Interseting quandry...

Click to expand...

Krausen looks normal, infection is doubtful.

Hydrometer reads 0 in water, seems to be ok.

HomerJR said:

Couple of observations:

Half liter starter -- does that mean a half liter of slurry, or a half liter of liquid? Mr. Malty suggests a 3.4 liter starter, or 123 ml of slurry. You mentioned the starter was "really bubbling away" when you pitched it. This means the yeast were not done multiplying (correct me if I'm wrong).

I think your problem might be seriously underpitching yeast. I'm thinking that adding your dry hops and the onset of fermentation might just be coincidental. You underpitched the first batch, then racked to secondary, which lost most of your yeast. You underpitched again, then a week (or so) later the yeast have finally multiplied enough to start up again. Just happens to be after you dry hopped.

Either that or your hydrometer is just screwed up. Which could happen. Might want to borrow another one to see if you get the same readings.

Click to expand...

When I say liter or half liter it is in reference to the entire starter. What makes me think that it's not underpitching is 2 things:

1. The origional pitch did start a rigerous fermentation and the 2nd starter was done with yeast I washed out of the first yeast cake.

2. When I pitched the 2nd batch, I did start to see signs of fermentation then...nothing for more than 2 weeks. This also was a starter of double the size.

IrregularPulse said:

There are people here who, although not ideal, pitch a single tube of liquid yeast instead of making a starter. YOu should at least get something. I second trying a different hydrometer although i couldn't imagine it'd be messed up to the point of not registering any change what so ever.

Was this an extract or AG recipe? if AG what were your mash temps?

Click to expand...

Extract.

HomerJR said:

I'm curious if the gravity has dropped yet. If, as the OP says, it's "going absolutely ape tits", then you should see a SG drop in a 24 hour period.

Click to expand...

I'll check this in a couple of hours and report back. But now it's time for jiu jitsu class.

Though I have never done it myself, my friends have gotten yeast from bottles and have had mixed results.

The one problem was verifying if the activity was actually the yeast and not an infection, or a combination of both. The other unknown we had was that we were at a toss up if gen 1 for yeast out of a bottle of beer was actually strong enough to ferment.

I'm baffled. I'm curious as to how this turns out.

Did you aerate properly?

I'm thinking lack of O2 would make the yeast poop out, and you added some O2 when you dumped in the dry hops, which might be why it restarted but pooped out again once it burned through that tiny amount of O2.

I do a very vigerous pour when I move my wort into the fermenter. Plus as I said in my first post it's going ape tits now. Why ferment now after nearly 2 months???

What really gets me is that when I made both starters, there were VERY visable signs of active yeast. I'm starting to belive that disconnex's assertation of weak gen 1 yeast may be the culprit.

When I finally keg I may wash this yeast and see how it reacts next time I use it.

Took a gravity reading today. 1.034

If I were you, I'd pitch some real yeast. This Pacman thing is clearly a failed experiment.