Expired White Labs Yeast ?

[d3vo]

Hello everyone. I am borrowing a friends homebrew equipment and this is my first go at it. He had ordered a Fat Tire replica brew that he did not use so I told him I would buy that from him and try it. Come to find out the yeast has a best if used by date on it that is almost a year old. It has been kept in the fridge up until the last 12 hrs before I used it.
My beer is in the primary fermenter for about 36 hrs and I havent noticed any action with the airlock. Should I just wait and see what happens after 7 days and take a hydrometer reading before moving to a secondary fermenter?
My main concern is that of the older yeast. Anyone ever used older yeast like this and had good results? Or should I not be worrying about it being that old?
My yeast was a liquid form white labs brand.

 

[downtown3641]

I was going to suggest making a starter before I saw that you've already brewed. I say, if you don't have access to a LHBS, go ahead and pitch it.

 

[jwbeard]

It can take up to 72 hrs for visible signs of fermentation, and with old yeast, 36 hrs isnt surprising. Let it ride for now.

Whether or not you observe bubbles (sometimes a hood or a bucket lid isn't airtight and the CO2 seeps out with no bubbling visible), there should be a krausen ring left over after active fermentation - the dry stuff clinging to the walls of the carboy or bucket left over from the foam head that forms. If you dont see anything like this, or dont see bubbles on the top of the beer, its possible fermentation never took off. Take a gravity reading to be sure, and repitch if necessary.

Good luck!

 

[JonK331]

Get yourself some safale-05 and pitch it. The cell count in that old vial without a starter will probably not do what you want it to. Sooner than later is better so an infection can't take hold.

 

[ThreeDogsNE]

+1 on repitching. Looking at Mr. Malty, one year old yeast should have about 1% viability. If this is a 5 gallon batch at O.G=1.050 or so, you wanted about 180 billion cells. You only pitched around 2 billion. Your wort is pretty vulnerable to infection. I'd give up on that yeast, and get enough live yeast in there to turn your wort into beer before some other bug takes it another direction. I usually keep some US-05 or Notty in the fridge in case my liquid yeast turns out to have been mishandled (baked or frozen) and fails me.

You might have brought that yeast back up to speed with stepping up starters. The effort and cost of this should not be forgotten. It's a hobby, so do what you enjoy. However, you might find that the few surviving cells are durable mutants that don't behave quite like the strain that White Labs sold last year.

 

[homebrewdad]

I'd go buy a new vial of yeast and repitch. A year out of date puts your beer way behind the 8 ball.

 

[KevinW]

Yes definintely get some fresh yeast. I have used expired yeasts quite a bit but I also do starters, the Safale should work or if you want try WLP007 Dry English Ale!

I do not recommend a "secondary" for your beer unless you are planning on dry hopping (Fat Tire does not require one). Let the beer sit for at least 3 weeks in the fermenter then bottle!

 

[kh54s10]

You can use 1 year old yeast but you would need to do a step starter to build up a healthy yeast count. It would probably take a step starter approach with several steps taking about a week.

I would follow advice you have already received. Get and pitch additional yeast.

When using liquid yeast I always make a starter.

 

[d3vo]

Thanks everyone for your great responses! This is a great forum!
I have good news, today the bubbles started to flow on the airlock. I warmed the bucket up a few degrees by moving it out of my cooler basement and moved it upstairs.
As far as the starter yeast or step starter many of you had mentioned, is that a small pill looking thing that I added to the wort in the last 15min of the boil? I thought it said it was a yeast starter or booster of some sort.
I think this brew looks like it might be ok?

 

[Thehopguy]

As far as the starter yeast or step starter many of you had mentioned, is that a small pill looking thing that I added to the wort in the last 15min of the boil? I thought it said it was a yeast starter or booster of some sort.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/wiki/index.php/Starter

Check that out and keep reading and using these forums, sounds like you got a lot to learn but you'll enjoy every minute of it!

 

[homebrewdad]

Thanks everyone for your great responses! This is a great forum!
I have good news, today the bubbles started to flow on the airlock. I warmed the bucket up a few degrees by moving it out of my cooler basement and moved it upstairs.
As far as the starter yeast or step starter many of you had mentioned, is that a small pill looking thing that I added to the wort in the last 15min of the boil? I thought it said it was a yeast starter or booster of some sort.
I think this brew looks like it might be ok?

Yeast nutrient or yeast booster is different than a starter.

For a starter, you basically take a small amount of malt extract and boil it in a small amount of water. Cool it, and pitch your yeast in that.

This gives them low gravity "beer" to grow in. Give this a day or so, and you can either pitch this into your beer, or repeat the starter process to grow even more yeast.