first yeast starter question...does this look right?

[jangelj]

I've brewed several extract batches, but never used a yeast starter. previously i have used dry yeast, and had success.
this time I am branching out and trying liquid yeast. I am brewing a pale ale and using White Labs California ale yeast (WLP001). I made a starter last night with 1.5 L water and 150 grams DME. Let it cool to about 76F, and pitched the yeast (which had been sitting at room temperature for about 3 hours and was about 74F).

This is what I have 16 hours later. there is def. some action, but not much at all. It has been on a stir plate for the whole time.
This yeast was shipped from Midwest with a bunch of other stuff about a week ago. So it sat in a box during shipment (which took about 4 days), then I kept it in the fridge until 3 hours before pitching.

I feel like I should have more action/fermentaion going on, but wanted to get expert opinions. I wanted to brew today, but maybe I should wait till tomorrow.

thoughts?
John

I have been lurking for awhile now, but this is my first post, so you'll have to click to see the pic.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/members/jangelj/albums/yeast-starter/33-img-3090-small.jpg

 

[jsullivan02130]

Looks like a starter to me. Process seems fine. Full speed ahead.

 

[Brocster]

I've brewed several extract batches, but never used a yeast starter. previously i have used dry yeast, and had success.
this time I am branching out and trying liquid yeast. I am brewing a pale ale and using White Labs California ale yeast (WLP001). I made a starter last night with 1.5 L water and 150 grams DME. Let it cool to about 76F, and pitched the yeast (which had been sitting at room temperature for about 3 hours and was about 74F).

This is what I have 16 hours later. there is def. some action, but not much at all. It has been on a stir plate for the whole time.
This yeast was shipped from Midwest with a bunch of other stuff about a week ago. So it sat in a box during shipment (which took about 4 days), then I kept it in the fridge until 3 hours before pitching.

I feel like I should have more action/fermentaion going on, but wanted to get expert opinions. I wanted to brew today, but maybe I should wait till tomorrow.

thoughts?
John

I have been lurking for awhile now, but this is my first post, so you'll have to click to see the pic.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/members/jangelj/albums/yeast-starter/33-img-3090-small.jpg

I think you are stellar. The stir plate is getting the O2 in there. I am no expert, but I think you are just seeing the end of the reproduction phase, or near the end, and more visible signs will soon appear.

You should be able to brew. There are two schools of thoughts on when to pitch. One is at high Krausen, or, around 24 - 36 hours. The other is to let the yeast settle down and then decant and pitch. You'll be good to go I believe.

Of course, your getting advice from a guy that actually forgot to pitch yeast not to long ago (I think the 8 homebrews with my brother played into that).

 

[jangelj]

thanks for the quick reply, guys. i feel much better. i guess I was just expecting a BUNCH of action, and potentially an overflow.

I may go ahead and brew today, since I have time. It will be about 20 hours after starting the starter, but that should be close enough to 24 hours.

 

[IrregularPulse]

I think you were looking for a big kraussens which you don't get on a stitplate

 

[jangelj]

yep, i was thinking I'd get a big krausen. It is on a stirplate, but no big krausen.

I brewed a batch, and will pitch the yeast in an hour or so when the temps are right. I'll post back when it starts fermenting.

 

[jangelj]

yep, i was thinking I'd get a big krausen. It is on a stirplate, but no big krausen.

I brewed a batch, and will pitch the yeast in an hour or so when the temps are right. I'll post back when it starts fermenting.

It started cranking about 5 hours after pitching. I'm good to go!

 

[Zen_Brew]

Generally the thick sort of peanut butter cloudy coloration, and the small bead of krausen you have around the top of your starter are the most obvious signs you are going to get from a starter that all is well. That and a nice pile of yeast on the bottom if you turn the plate off and let it settle out. There is just not enough food in a starter for the big boiling krausens like you see in a 5 gallon batch.

Glad to hear the beer took off quickly for ya.

 

[jalgayer]

Is that a little light on the DME for a starter? I thought it should be more DME (maybe 200g) but I have only done two starters and am a noob.

Is the 150g ok?

 

[Zen_Brew]

Your DME to water ratio was spot on. 1 gram dme per 10ml water. This should get you right around 1.040 for your starting gravity which is good. Anywhere in the 1.030 to 1.040 area is the recommended gravity for a starter. Heavier than that tends to put some measure undo stress on the yeast. It's not a deal breaker, just not ideal, so no worries if you ended up a bit heavy. The best way to verify starter gravity of course is with a hydrometer or refractometer. With the boil off you had, your gravity may be a tad on the heavy side. Your photo looks like you had a good amount of boil off as it looks like about 1200ml in your starter vessel. You really only need about 10-15 minutes of a light rolling boil to sterilize the starter.

 

[Kahuna]

What I don't get is that you said you used 150 grams of DME and 1.5 liters of water. But the volume in the flask in the jpg is 1.2 liters. Did you have some major boilovers?

 

[mojotele]

That's pretty much what all my starters look like. I think I've only seen a nice krausen once, and that was on a really big starter.

 

[jangelj]

What I don't get is that you said you used 150 grams of DME and 1.5 liters of water. But the volume in the flask in the jpg is 1.2 liters. Did you have some major boilovers?

I boiled the DME for like 25 minutes (I was busy elsewhere). I think a good bit of the liquid boiled off. I didn't measure the gravity before I pitched the yeast in it.

The good news is that my brew took off like crazy, so I am a happy camper. That was the first time I have used a starter. I look forward to harvesting the yeast from the primary fermenter for future use, too.

 

[RogueGoose85]

Your DME to water ratio was spot on. 1 gram dme per 10ml water. This should get you right around 1.040 for your starting gravity which is good. Anywhere in the 1.030 to 1.040 area is the recommended gravity for a starter. Heavier than that tends to put some measure undo stress on the yeast. It's not a deal breaker, just not ideal, so no worries if you ended up a bit heavy. The best way to verify starter gravity of course is with a hydrometer or refractometer. With the boil off you had, your gravity may be a tad on the heavy side. Your photo looks like you had a good amount of boil off as it looks like about 1200ml in your starter vessel. You really only need about 10-15 minutes of a light rolling boil to sterilize the starter.

This is the issue i just had (my first starter). Im doing a 1 liter, and with boil off ended up with 800ml. From your post i see that i will have a heavy gravity, at what point would this be an issue? Should I be OK with the 800ml, or should i just make another one? (I know you mention its not a deal breaker, but just want to know when that 'not ideal' becomes a deal breaker )

 

[emjay]

This is the issue i just had (my first starter). Im doing a 1 liter, and with boil off ended up with 800ml. From your post i see that i will have a heavy gravity, at what point would this be an issue? Should I be OK with the 800ml, or should i just make another one? (I know you mention its not a deal breaker, but just want to know when that 'not ideal' becomes a deal breaker )

There's no realistic point where it becomes an absolute deal breaker, even well past 1.100, but it becomes increasingly less ideal, and it's basically up to each person to make a judgment call as to how far they'll let it get out of that ideal range before they feel they'd rather make take up more time and money with another starter, and since these things are valued differently by everybody, one can only decide for themselves what that point is using their own experience and the faith that they're making the right call.

Probably not the answer you were looking for, though. So I tried to consider at what point I'd personally do it, and I figure that the small amount of DME in a starter is cheap enough that I'd CONSIDER it if it went higher than 1.055, assuming I didn't pitch the yeast yet (you really should check the gravity before pitching anyways.) But if I accidentally pitched first, I'd be way more reluctant to waste the money on the vial of yeast, and accordingly my limit would be much higher.

I even made a rhyme for myself - "when in doubt, throw it out," but then I realized if I missed the mark, I could just top it off with more sterile water (or DME, if I somehow made it too weak) to reach 1.040, mix it well, and pour out the excess wort so that my volume is spot on too. In your case, topping it off with 300ml of water is probably all that was needed. In the worst case, if I had already pitched the yeast, I could add some water to hit 1.040, let it ferment, shake it up thoroughly and, using a calculator, find out how many cells I created vs how many I needed, and then pour out an amount of starter proportional to that excess and I'd be left with the right amount of cells in the flask

Really though, it's never come to that because I use fermcap to prevent boilovers. The tiny extra cost of using fermcap is well worth avoiding the headache.

 

[RogueGoose85]

alright thanks. I didnt take a gravity reading, at the time i didnt think it was very much needed since i was going by the book (turns out i wasnt since im 200ml short). Ill certainly take a gravity reading next time.

Your point avout just topping it off with sterile water is a good idea. Its been two and half hours since ive put the foil on..im assuming way to late to add water.

Another thing is, i just looked at the yeast pitching calculator, and with my beer having a SG of 1.064, i should be doing at least a 2L starter, so I am well below where I should be. Heavily considering to just remake it. But then again, Billy Brew's "Any starter is better than no starter" keeps playing in my head.

Thanks for the input, emjay

 

[RogueGoose85]

how would i take the gravity of a starter anyways? I have the hydrometer, and a test jar..but i would think id have to use quite a bit of starter to fill the test jar and then dont i have to throw away the tested wort, which would of course decrease the amount of starter i have. Am i approaching this incorrectly?

 

[emjay]

Just make sure to sanitize the test jar and hydrometer well, and since it's still unfermented wort it shouldn't create a problem.

Of course, if you measure carefully using the 10:1 ratio and avoid boilovers (again... fermcap ), it's not even necessary to measure the gravity - the only thing that could still happen is boiling off a bit too much of the water, but since DME doesn't evaporate with the water, all you'd have to do is top it off with more water to get back to the correct volume.