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For your first, I would use a commercial lacto culture. Make a 500ml starter like you would for yeast, let the lacto go for 2 days, keep warm if possible, no stir bar. Make wort as usual after the starter is done, boil for a few minutes, no hops. Chill to 90F, dump whole lacto starter, and keep...

It works, but not for a long time. As Diver said, the CO2 will come out of solution due to partial pressures. But I don't keep my kegs hooked up to CO2 all the time, so relieving the pressure from time to time and recarbing (with a stone) isn't a big deal to me. Overnight carb, pressurize with...

It may help to degas the sample. Take a slightly larger sample and shake it for a while. Should help clear the line a bit.

As long as the yeast have stopped off gassing, this isn't an issue. For instance, treat a starter like a primary fermenter if you're going to seal it, let it go 10 days before sealing. If it gasses in the bag, it will fill, and only if it's under some pressure after that in the fridge will...

I think it's a great idea. If it were me, I would seal it once most of the liquid was removed, not pull a vacuum on it. Keep an eye on the bags in the fridge. They may expand with time as they off gas depending on the strain and how long they were in primary. I package in autoclaved retort...

Bennett Springs, that place is awesome. Used to fly fish there back in college 18 years ago. Lots of 'bows on the line. Brings me back...

Great project! If Bootleg wants to charge you to do a test if you're interested in doing that, PM me. I run a propagation lab in NC, and I'd be happy to identify/characterize it for you as best I can.

Some back ribs and cut up butt for a neighborhood party. Need to get it done quick, and I like more bark in the pulled pork. Mmmmm....

I would suggest growing the yeast along with algae with a continual injection of sugar as to keep the CO2 production/fermentation active, rather than using the algae as a food source for the yeast. Cool idea, good luck. Yeast are incredibly resilient, and a good candidate for something like...

Yeah, that's what I do, just open it up for as little time as possible and seal when you're done.

Yep

As far as slurry volume, it should be noted that I have seen some strains take up almost twice the volume of another strain with the same compacted total number of cells, PacMan is a good example, they're pretty plump cells. You can clean the tubes, and sanitize by chemical, but they're not...

The tubes come with a holder typically, and none can be autoclaved that I've seen. You could get glass vials and autoclave those and reuse them. Yeah, going up to 2L for a 10 gal batch makes good sense. As long as you're getting enough cell density.

You can see bacteria through a scope, though you would usually need a good 40x objective. The cheapest way to test for viable bacteria is to do serial dilutions of the sample, and plate a low volume out on agar. Grow the plate for a few days and count bacteria/yeast colonies. There's no cheap...

Yeah, as long as the final glycerin concentration is around 12.5% it would work just fine to freeze as normal. However, you would also be storing any bacteria or wild yeast present in the slurry from brewing, so it may defeat the purpose of a frozen pure stock.

Nope, they're single use as far as I'm concerned. Cheap enough. But you could reuse them using a caustic, acid, starsan treatment. If you put a different yeast strain in there, the extra effort would help against contamination. They can't be autoclaved.

~15psi

Let me step in here, because it seems that I unintentionally touched a few sensitive parts on some folks, and not the fun parts. This article was born out of a discussion with a friend of mine who was trying to get out of bag hoisting, and we had a long talk of what might be gained/lost in...

Top cropping is a great way to collect a selection of highly active yeast. Collecting from the bottom after fermentation essentially gets you the same result, but cropping ensures an active population.

Here are some more, smaller pack: http://amzn.com/B00ES3TIRG I make a 300ml stock solution of 25-30% glycerin in a pint size jar, pressure cook and just use it as needed until empty. It's enough for 6 batches (60 tubes).