White Labs WLP029 thoughts?

[brehm21]

Have many people used this yeast much? I didn't get much feedback from a searching.
On Saturday (4 days ago) I brewed an Alaskan Amber Clone "attempt" and pitched a smallish starter. This morning I had still not seen ANY airlock motion, so I did what every man does when they're upset. I shook the hell out of it. (good thing I don't have kids!) When I got home from work tonight there was a steady bubbling and a nice krausen. Yaayy!
I noticed when I made the starter that it took a while to take off, but I was way past the "best before" date on the vial. I pitched at about 68°F, so that shouldn't be an issue.

Has anyone else experienced slow starts with this yeast? Or did I get an old has-been vial?

I'm guessing my beer will taste fine despite the slow start. Only time will tell.

 

[butler1850]

one would ask "How 'way past' the date?"

If it's marching on I'd bet you're fine as long as your sanitation was fine to begin with.

 

[uglygoat]

i used this yeast last year during the winter... the yeast first collected at the bottom and sat there for a day, untill i shook it, and it rose to the top and really took off. not sure if it's the way that strain works, but my experience was similart to yours.

 

[azmtnbiker]

I really like this yeast for alts. I have used it 3 times and it always seems to start slow even when I pitched unto a yeast cake of it. Once it gets going to takes off like a rocket and ferments out within a couple of days. If you ferment on the low end of the scale 64 or 65 it will give you a clean lager like beer. I usually lager my alts for a month too which I think helps.

 

[McCall St. Brewer]

I usually lager my alts for a month too which I think helps.

I was afraid of that. I have an alt in the secondary and I was wondering how long to leave it there. I suspected that it should probably stay there awhile, but you are at least the 2nd person who has confirmed that.

 

[brehm21]

Well, it was certainly a slow start. And it's been going steady for about 4 days now. It's started slowing down today. I know this isn't best, but the temp has been up and down between about 65 and 73°.

The recipe I found called for 21 days at 40°. I may leave it a little longer if I have the patience. This is my first attempt at lagering so I'm a little anxious. Am I correct assuming that all the fermentation is going to stop once I drop the temp, and the month wait is just conditioning?

Glad to see some people that make alts! I haven't read too much about altbiers here, although I haven't looked really hard.