My 10 gal lager yeast starter plan

Mr. Malty says I need 687billion yeast cells for my 10 gallon 1.049 OG lager.

Id prefer to start with one pack of wyeast.

I figured I will put the one vial of yeast into 1L of wort and put it on my stirplate. utilizing the table found here http://billybrew.com/stepping-up-a-yeast-starter and assuming that a stirplate will yield twice the results shown in the table (stated in the literature below the table):

(1vial + 1L of wort)= 150 billion yeast cells-->*2 for the stir plate=300 billion yeast cells.

after chilling and decanting, i will put the remaining yeast into a 1 gal jug with 3L of wort.

(300billion yeast cells + 3L of wort) = 450 billion yeast cells * 2for the stir plate = 900billion yeast cells.

this will be chilled and decanted and allowed to warm to pitching temp on brew day. not wanting to over pitch i will (by eye/graduated measuring device) split this up into 35/35/30 size portions and save the 30 portion for a future starter, the two 35's will be put into separate 5 gal carboys.


any flaws someone wants to point out? it would be greatly appreciated.

a couple questions,
1. how long should the two steps last?

2. what would you expect the yeast density to be after chilling/decanting (cells/mL). not sure how plausible it is to give an estimate on that, but knowing it could kind of help understand how much of an impact the stir plate had vs. a simple starter with regards to the table, as in is it really double or is it triple or is it 50% more?

1) Assuming log-growth-phase (plentiful nutrients, not too crowded), it takes yeast approximately 60 minutes to double in population. When they first start out and when they are just finishing up, they are not in logarithmic growth.

2) I don't know the effect of planktonic style growth vs. non-planktonic growth on yeast. I don't find 2x unbelievable, though. The main restrictors to yeast growth will be, as I said before, nutrient and liquid volume capacity. As for pouring off the top, that depends on your technique (gentleness, duration of cooling, etc.) and on the flocculation of the yeast in the starter. Estimating 90% sedimentation is reasonable, I assume.

Overpitching by a couple billion here or there is not a big deal. I personally think only beer perfectionists worry about overpitching... everyone who is not a 48+ BJCP brewer should just overpitch (better too much than too little) and not worry about it. That's my $.02, anyways.

so based on what your saying in 1 and 2, is the step even necessary? why not just put a little less than 4 liters of wort in my jug, pitch the yeast in that and let it sit on the stir plate for 12 hours-ish, chill and decant that?

that is, given that they are at the peak 'k' value in a first order reaction environment, that k value should not drop until they have a decrease in access to volume and nutrient, which would lead to more than a double in growth, correct?

i guess this is really what the chart says, but even doubling its values only gives me a 500billion count, so the step up would be helpful?

IMO, I brew a lot of lagers and really dont go off Mr. Malty at all. What I like to do, is do a one liter starter (this is all on a stir plate), let it do its thing for 36hrs or so, put it in the fridge over night decant, pitch a higher gravity 1L of wort, and at high krausen pitch it into the fermentor. Ive found that when pitching at high krausen really helps lagers out to get up and going. I did this recently with a 1.070 dopplebock, and it was off in 12hrs.

BH10, this is for a 5 gallon batch or a 10?

Good luck. I sure like the simplicity of dry lager yeast.

CrossCreekBrewing said:

BH10, this is for a 5 gallon batch or a 10?

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Sorry should have said that, its for a 5.5 gallon batch. So just double what I said.

I just did this for a 10gal lager I needed 760 billion cells for:
1. Make 2 L starter and pitch 1 vial. Stirplate for about 24 - 36 hours.
2. Chill overnight.
3. Decant and pitch slurry into a 4L starter. Stirplate for 24 - 36 hours.
4. Chill overnight
5. Brew Day
6. After brewing, decant liquid off yeast and in same flask add some fresh wort from today's brew. Let go overnight at the temp you expect to pitch at. Also, let wort for brew chill overnight.
7. Next day, aerate wort, pitch entire starter without decanting anything.

osagedr said:

Good luck. I sure like the simplicity of dry lager yeast.

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Do you not use a starter when you use dry yeast? I would imagine it would still be a pretty good idea, and most calculators have an option for it.

You do not need to do multiple steps. You could just do it all in one.

Justibone said:

You do not need to do multiple steps. You could just do it all in one.

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You COULD if you had a 10L flask on a stir plate, but you risk the health and effectiveness of the yeast taking that large of a step.

CrossCreekBrewing said:

Do you not use a starter when you use dry yeast? I would imagine it would still be a pretty good idea, and most calculators have an option for it.

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Not only is a starter not required, it could actually be detrimental to your yeast's health. I always rehydrate my dry yeast (even though it's not always necessary) but never a starter.

enohcs said:

You COULD if you had a 10L flask on a stir plate, but you risk the health and effectiveness of the yeast taking that large of a step.

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Isn't 10L kind of a lot? Isn't that 2.5 gallons? Does it really take that large of a starter?

Justibone said:

Isn't 10L kind of a lot? Isn't that 2.5 gallons? Does it really take that large of a starter?

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Takes whatever size of a starter gets you to the right cell count. Some big lagers call for over 800 billion cells. Repitching from slurry works well in those cases.

osagedr said:

Takes whatever size of a starter gets you to the right cell count. Some big lagers call for over 800 billion cells. Repitching from slurry works well in those cases.

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Or you could do a step up starter as the OP is trying to figure out.

enohcs said:

Or you could do a step up starter as the OP is trying to figure out.

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Yep, I hope it works well for him.

I will post results

bh10 said:

IMO, I brew a lot of lagers and really dont go off Mr. Malty at all. What I like to do, is do a one liter starter (this is all on a stir plate), let it do its thing for 36hrs or so, put it in the fridge over night decant, pitch a higher gravity 1L of wort, and at high krausen pitch it into the fermentor. Ive found that when pitching at high krausen really helps lagers out to get up and going. I did this recently with a 1.070 dopplebock, and it was off in 12hrs.

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I brew a lot of lagers and ferment my starters at a temp close to fermenting my wort. Obviously, you use a stir plate so you can't so this.

What is better? Room temp or cold ferment? Or does it matter.

Bulls Beers said:

I brew a lot of lagers and ferment my starters at a temp close to fermenting my wort. Obviously, you use a stir plate so you can't so this.

What is better? Room temp or cold ferment? Or does it matter.

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I do starters at ferm temp with lagers on a stir plate with no problem.

I've done starters both at room temp and at ferm temp. I've had good luck with both, but if time is no issue I would go ferm temp. If I need the starter to be done in a few days, I go room temp.

osagedr said:

I do starters at ferm temp with lagers on a stir plate with no problem.

I've done starters both at room temp and at ferm temp. I've had good luck with both, but if time is no issue I would go ferm temp. If I need the starter to be done in a few days, I go room temp.

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When you do a starter at ferm temp, how long do you give it?

Bulls Beers said:

When you do a starter at ferm temp, how long do you give it?

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For an ale where the starter will be pitched, somewhere between 12 and 18 hours (generally aiming for high krausen).

For lagers the starters are normally so large I intend to let them finish fermentation, then I chill them. When my wort is the proper temperature I decant the beer and pitch just the slurry. It can kinda depend on the yeast strain, but if you want to pitch at ferm temps, it could easily take a week to finish, sometimes even longer. I think in general I'd feel pretty good about a week. I normally ferment my lagers in the mid-40s but in that case I would do the starter in the low-50s just to be sure it was done in time.

I've been doing Deathbrewers yeast starter pictorial, which is great, but I've been totally under pitching. My lagers have been coming out really good, But I'd like to make them even better. I have to focus more on making a bigger starter.

One question I have is when you step up a yeast starter, do you let ferm the same amount of time on each step up? When I do a starter for my lagers, I usually let ferm out for about 3 or 4 days. Should I do that the same time for each?

I just bought Jamil's book on yeast, can't wait to read it.

Aside from Tom Hargrave, whom I'll never deal with again, I don't know anyone who makes a stir plate large enough to handle lager-sized starters. There are large capacity commercial lab stirrers available on ebay from time to time, but there are no homebrew equipment makers that I know of (besides the new one that Hargrave is about to start marketing) making stirrers that are designed for larger starters. It's as if all the home brew equipment makers imagine that no one will ever need a starter larger than 2000 ml.

billtzk said:

t's as if all the home brew equipment makers imagine that no one will ever need a starter larger than 2000 ml.

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Maybe they just want you to buy two complete starter sets.

Justibone said:

Maybe they just want you to buy two complete starter sets.

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Or step up your starters.

Use this calc to step up your starter. Someone on here made it and it works really well. From the looks of the calc you're going to need a 1.5L starter then a 3.5L starter.

YeastCalc Yeast Calculator

And you would need a 12L starter if you didn't step it up. Here is some good info on growth rates.

YeastCalc Growth Charts