What is a 2 liter starter?

zackattack784 · Feb 5, 2015

I recently got a yeast starter kit from northern brewer. The directions have me a little confused. It has directions for a 1 liter and a 2 liter starter. The 1 liter directions say to use 650mL of water and the 2 liter directions say to use 1300mL of water.

Maybe it's just me, but I was under the impression a 2 liter starter would use 2 liters of water. So what's the actual definition of a 2 liter starter? I'm doing my first all grain brew this weekend and beer smith tells me I need a 1.2L starter. I was just going to follow Northern Brewers directions for a "2 liter" starter.

jahdub · Feb 6, 2015

The extract you add to the water will take volume. Volumes are not additive, though, unless you're adding the volume of the same thing together (ie. 500ml water + 500 ml water = 1000 ml water)

The short of it is that the extract takes up space, so your starter "size" will be more than the amount of water required.

That said, a 1L starter probably needs more than 650 mL of water, and a 2L starter probably needs more than 1300 mL of water. About 900 mL for a liter and 1800 mL for a 2L would get you pretty close to where you need to be. I know that goes against my first point, but being THAT precise really doesn't make much of a difference for starters.

Strictly speaking, a 2L starter is 2L of 1.040 wort. It takes trial and error and/or math to get exactly there. There's nothing wrong with estimating for this, though. Personally, I use about a quart of water + 90 +/- 5 grams of DME to get me to approx a liter of starter.

Summers · Feb 6, 2015

I recently did my first starter and the rule of thumb I was given was 1g of DME to 10ml of water and to use a yeast calculator to find out how much yeast you need. The main take away is not the volume of the starter but the quantity of yeast needed.

Mrmalty was the one that I was told to use.
http://www.mrmalty.com/calc/calc.html

tally350z · Feb 6, 2015

Are you going to be boiling your starter in the flask? If not just follow these simple steps. Fill the flask to 1.5 liter mark, put the water in a sause pan. Start heating the water. Add the 150 grams of DME. The ratio is 10 grams of DME to every 100ml of water, simple. Bring to a boil carefully, get through the hot break, add lid, kill heat and chill. I have never gone longer than a minute during the boil.

zackattack784 · Feb 6, 2015

tally350z said:
Are you going to be boiling your starter in the flask? If not just follow these simple steps. Fill the flask to 1.5 liter mark, put the water in a sause pan. Start heating the water. Add the 150 grams of DME. The ratio is 10 grams of DME to every 100ml of water, simple. Bring to a boil carefully, get through the hot break, add lid, kill heat and chill. I have never gone longer than a minute during the boil.

This will be my second starter. First starter I did 1 cup DME 1300mL of water and boiled for 15 minutes. Transferred to flask, cooled, then pitched yeast. It worked fine. I just want to know for future reference when a calculator tells me I need a 2 liter, 1.5 liter, etc. starter.