WYEAST Hella Bocks mishap... or is it?

[Meat6895]

So my wife requested for a helles Bock. Ive got about a dozen batches under my belt and went like i always do. I got a recipe off brewsmith and went to town. The only bad thing is that the morning after i brewed i happen to look at a few other recipes and saw that it was brewed like a lager. I frantacly dug my yeast package out of the garbage to look again. It says that i should pitch it from 68-72 degrees but when i looked online for WYEAST 2487 hella bock it says its more like a lager and should be brewed around 48-52 degrees. I called Wyeast and they said it should be ok if i chill it down to the appropriate temp. i checked it this morning and the Krausen is still on top and hasnt fallen but im not getting anything from the blowoff tube.
I took a sample with my theif to check the gravity and dropped my hydrometer smashing it into a few pieces......

So i wish i would have known it was brewed like a lager, my mistake. So should i give up and scrap the whole batch or let it go and possibly waste my time?

 

[shortyz]

the best discoveries come from our own mistakes. stick it in the corner and let it do its thing. its beer not rocket science!

im sure it will turn out fine, also dont open the lid! lol

 

[dcp27]

lagers tend to put off less activity than ales, if theres a krausen don't worry about it. you definitely hugely underpitched tho, lagers need twice as much yeast. the higher temp will just make it less clean/crisp & lager-like, it's not gunna ruin it

fyi, you should never pitch anything @68-72F, except maybe a belgian or saison strain. its best to pitch below the temp you intend to ferment at

 

[Meat6895]

Ya, that's kinda what I got from the tech at Wyeast too. I actually pitched about 6billion yeast cells after the starter had done it's job. I mainly did this due to the gravity of beer I was making.

So when I talked to the tech he said I should do my starter at 68-72 and pitch at 68-72 but then bring the temp down. I've read a few things about doing your starter at the fermentation temp and pitching at the 48-55. It's there a reason for this? Even the packaging says to pitch at 65 to 72. I wonder if it's just the universal packaging for all their strains.

 

[dcp27]

oh ok, i didnt realize you made a starter, that's at least better. i assume thats a typo on the cells as a pack itself has 100billion

making the starter that high is perfectly fine, but you should be crashing it, bringing it to within 5-10 degrees of ferment temp, decanting & pitching. pitching high and lowering it after is just asking for fermentation flaws and in the case of lagers greatly increases the amount of diacetyl that must be reduced. be sure to do a diacetyl rest by raising your temp back into the 60s towards the end of active fermentation (ideally 75% of the way thru)