did I mess up??

[FreeLordBrewing]

brewed my brewers best Imperial pale ale tonight got my OG right at 1.085 (what it calls for in the target gravity) ended up with 4.5 gallons at the end of everything.

made a starter with 200 grams of Mutons plain light DME 2 liters of water boiled for 15 minutes added yeast nutrient at last 10 min of boil (of the flask) ended up with 1.040 gravity installed two Wyeast smack packs of American ale 1065 (200 billion yeast cells) let it sit for approx 24 hours had a steady bubbling out of the air lock at 68 degrees F based off of mrmalty/beersmith I needed 340 billion yeast cells for this batch (4 billion yeast cells per point of gravity = 85 x 4 billion = 340 billion. Figured in a 24 hour period I should of had at least a minimal of 400 billion.

aerated my wort by pouring from the brew kettle through a strainer heavily (lots of foam/bubbles) ended up with a temperature of 64 degrees F after topping up with refrigerated water to reach my OG of 1.085. I then removed air lock, and rubber cork from flask swished it around and poured the yeast/starter into fermenter (6 gallon ale pail bucket sanitized with starsan) this was at 5:15 pm

just came back home (1:00 am) and checked on the fermenter/air lock no activity what so ever!!?!? it has been approx 8 hours. and the fermenter is sitting right at 64 degrees.

Did I shock the yeast by going from 68 F to 64 F degrees?? the wyeast packs said good down to 60 degrees F. does it take longer for the yeast to become active with a higher gravity even with a starter?? Did I skip a step with the starter??? I never measured the gravity of the starter before pitching it into the 1.085 wort. Did I pitch too premature for the yeast to be healthy enough?

I am confused I thought it would take off at this point or at least see "some" bubbling its dead and hasn't bubbled yet.....is this normal should I give it at least 24 hours before seeing any activity?? this is my first attempt at a higher gravity batch/starter....I'm starting to worry ughh any insight would be appreciated thanks in advance - Shawn

 

[AvgWhiteGuy]

Give it time. I've had well aerated worts that I pitched starters on to them and still had lag times of more than 8 hours. Have a night's sleep and when you wake up, you should have fermentation going on.

 

[beerman0001]

Thats a big beer the yeast are reproducing right now getting ready to go to work. Don't worry until its been 72 hours.

 

[Iqbal624]

I wouldnt worry too much yet. See how it is in the am first...

 

[FreeLordBrewing]

double checked it this morning found it to be bubbling but very slowly. The air lock is releasing about 6 large bubbles at one time then sitting for about 30 seconds and then releasing another 6 large bubbles!! whew!! here I thought something may have gone wrong. Thanks for all the reassurance

 

[spazjdm]

with such a big beer, you might want to replace the airlock with a blow-off tube.

 

[NordeastBrewer77]

you also may want to stop using the airlock bubble to judge things by. many times it bubbles for no reason, other times it doesn't bubble at all. a temp change can make it bubble, as can the vibrations of someone walking by. sometimes the co2 finds an easier way out of the fermenter and the airlock remains pinned to the post during fermentation.

 

[FreeLordBrewing]

I thought about the blow off tube but with only 4.5 gallons I'm pretty sure I have enough head space.

thanks Nordeastbrewer77 I'll keep it in mind thanks, I figured with the creation of co2 it has to go some where especially if the lid is on tight?!? I have never run into an air lock not producing any bubbles with all my batches and was only basing it off of that... but I'm still a noob at about 9 batches. thanks!