Do I need a starter?

I'm brewing a brown ale with an SG around 1.060 on Friday. I'm using an old pack of Windsor, I'm not sure exactly how old it is, I got it at least 6 months ago and it is in the old packaging but it doesn't actually expire until November of this year. I have some light DME on hand, is it worth the trouble of making a starter at this point or is the yeast still viable enough that I don't need to bother?

rancidcrabtree said:

I'm using an old pack of Windsor, I'm not sure exactly how old it is, I got it at least 6 months ago and it is in the old packaging but it doesn't actually expire until November of this year. I have some light DME on hand, is it worth the trouble of making a starter at this point or is the yeast still viable enough that I don't need to bother?

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Is it a liquid or dry yeast? If it's a liquid yeast it's probably worth buying a new pack/vial and doing a liquid. Yeast starters are important with liquid yeast. You can go look in the Fermentation forum to see all the debate/argument over a 15 minute step to improve your beer.

If it's a dry yeast you're probably fine. Dry yeasts are cheap and if I was worried about it, I'd go spend a couple bucks on a new packet. Check Mr. Malty to determine if you need another packet to hit the desired pitching rate.

I would recommend making a starter.

I always make a starter. I do a 1000ml starter for anything under 1.060 and a 2000ml starter for over 1.060/Lager.

Since it's dry yeast, you'll be fine without a starter. Generally, making a starter for dry yeast is not recommended.

It's dry yeast which I normally just direct pitch with. The only reason I was asking is because this pack is a little old. I'm thinking I'll just direct pitch again, especially since the SG of 1.060 is assuming it hit 70%, which almost never happens for me.

1.060 isn't all that high. I think you'll be fine.

Thanks Denny! I'm actually planning on trying your Cheap 'n' Easy Batch Sparge Brewing advice for this next batch to see if I can break out of the 60% slump I seem to be stuck in.

Good luck! Batch sparging can help if you don't have a well designed lautering system, but most often efficiency problems are caused by a poor crush.

Yep, I'll be batch sparging according to your method and I'll be dialing the crush on my Barley Crusher a bit tighter than last time (which was the default setting it came with). I'm going to keep going tighter every brew until I get either the efficiency I want or stuck!

rancidcrabtree said:

I'm going to keep going tighter every brew until I get either the efficiency I want or stuck!

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That's exactly what I did and I average 85% now.

Denny said:

That's exactly what I did and I average 85% now.

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That's awesome! I hope to get my process dialed in to where I can get a decently high and repeatable efficiency every time I brew. How long did it take you to get to that point?

rancidcrabtree said:

That's awesome! I hope to get my process dialed in to where I can get a decently high and repeatable efficiency every time I brew. How long did it take you to get to that point?

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Once I started experimenting, not more than 2-3 brews.

I was at the local brewstore last weekend and all the folks there agreed that they had all quit using a starter even with liquid yeast? What up with that?

Who knows? Maybe they can't tell the difference, maybe they just don't want to mess with it.

ron said:

I was at the local brewstore last weekend and all the folks there agreed that they had all quit using a starter even with liquid yeast? What up with that?

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Who knows? The information is out there, if they want to ignore it let them. More ribbons for me

Alright, two weeks later and here's the latest: it took off right away, vigorous fermentation and large krausen within 8 hours, two days later it stopped. Two weeks later now and it seems to be stuck at 1.022. Is this typical for old yeast, especially old Windsor?? I racked to secondary because I needed room in primary for today's brew. What should I do with this brown ale that's stuck at 1.022? Hydro sample tasted delicious and not even all that sweet. I could possibly pick up a fresh pack of Windsor and pitch it or else maybe a pack of US-05, or I could just let it sit. Any thoughts??

Did you just sprinkle the yeast on top of the wort or did you properly rehydrate it?

I vote your done. The yeast did their thing. Give it another week and bottle. That's what I would do.

I sprinkled, didn't bother with rehydrating. I'll let it sit in secondary for a while and then bottle, I'm not in a huge hurry anyways. It tastes good as it is, my only concern is that I might be making bombs when I do get around to bottling it.