Starter crapped out??

[WrongCoastBrewery]

So after making my starter for a brewing on Saturday, I directly pitched it into my wort. Oddly enough, fermentation was not so vigorous as I have seen with my other starters. Granted, I completely understand fermentation is hard to judge, but as of this morning, no signs of fermentation and the airlock was dead quiet. I use a three peice and the inner piece was at the bottom of the airlock. Here are the details:

Starter

1L using 10:1 ratio of water to DME
Wyeast Activator American Ale (only 30 days old)
Kept swirling it every so often as I do not have a stir plate yet
Kept it at about 70F for 18 hours
Fermentation was vigorous and had a nice krausen on the starter.

Wort

Basic Cream Ale extract recipe
SG: 1.049
Used three piece airlock w/ cheapo vodka
Fermentation chamber at a relatively constant 68F (+/- 1 degree)


Thoughts?

 

[Skyforger]

That is somewhat odd. 36 hours isn't quite long enough to call a dead fermentation, but still. The only things I can think of are:

1) What temperature did you pitch the yeast at? i.e. what temp was the starter at pitching time, and what temp was the wort?
2) How did you oxygenate the starter and the wort?

Basic questions, I know, but these would be the first things to check.

 

[WrongCoastBrewery]

Indeed and I forgot that info.

1) The temperatures where right around 70F. The starter never made it to the fridge and I pitched it at high krausen. The wort too was around the same temperature. When it left the brewpot, it was at 75F and down to 70-72 when the yeast hit the wort.

2) I use a two step method for aerating my wort since I dont have the oxygen setup yet. I first strain the wort to my bottling bucket. Then I use the spigot of the bottling bucket to transfer it to the fermenter. Basically one sits on the counter and the other on the floor. Then I still the wort in the fermenter like hell for 5 minutes. I have used this method many times with no problems.

From what I can tell, typically this thing should be chugging vigorously along. Very weird. Guess I will give it a few days and then see if I got a stuck fermentation.

 

[waldoar15]

Too early to worry about it, IMHO.

Are you using a plastic bucket with a lid and just looking for airlock activity?

 

[Skyforger]

It's kind of a long shot, but I suppose if there's something head-killing in there you could get a fermentation without any easily visible signs of activity. Add to that a bucket with a non-airtight seal, and you won't get any airlock signs either. You could take a sample out and check for bubbles, but I wouldn't necessarily recommend it; you don't want to have any risk of infection if the yeast really hasn't taken off.

I would wait a day or two, then evaluate whether or not to repitch. It still is too early to really call the fermentation dead. I've had to wait longer before.

 

[Brewham]

Odds are overwhelming that you are just fine. I just finished a batch that never burped - I never heard a single bubble out of the airlock and yet when I racked it a week later it had gone from 1.056 to 1.012.

As many have pointed out here before, airlock activity is not a good indicator. And since Saturday is not really that long ago, your starter could still be starting. Wait a few days and take an SG reading. That is the ONLY way to know if fermentation is happening.