Yeast dropped from my starter in under an hour??

[Snicks]

Hey guys I may have a problem. I made a 1.5L starter last night using Wyeast Denny's Favourite 50. 24 hours later, I stopped the stir-plate and put it in the fridge to drop out the yeast as I normally do.

The problem is that the yeast dropped out of suspension and onto the bottom of the glass in less then an hour in the fridge, I made a starter of the same strain before and it took it two days to drop to the bottom. I checked the gravity of the starter wort and it did drop from 1.04 to about 1.032 so it was not completely dead. I have a total of about 110mL of solid on the bottom and while the wort on top is not fully clear, it is nowhere near as milky as it should be.

Has anyone experienced this with Denny's? Should I bother to use it? The production date was around the 10th of December.

 

[Yooper]

That seems ok but weird to me too! I have an APA that has been in the keg for three weeks at 40 degrees, and it's just starting to clear! I never have Denny's yeast give me clarity in a short time.

I guess yours cleared better because it wasn't really done and the temperature drop must have dropped them in their tracks so they flocculated out. Of course, cold crashing a starter before it's done isn't a good idea. I"d warm it back up, set it on the stir plate, and pitch the whole starter when it's time to pitch.

 

[Snicks]

An update on this:

I left it out on the counter to warm up and ferment overnight, and it again settled out within an hour today while warm. I rechecked the gravity and it only dropped another 2 points. I think it's now a lost cause, it has been dumped.

I wish I knew exactly what went wrong, my only guess is that perhaps it got frozen at some point, or maybe the DME (Wine Expert brand) I used was messed up somehow since it was supposed to be "X-tra Pale" but was a dark amber colour when prepared to 1.04?

I picked up a Wyeast 1968 London ESB to replace it, seemed to be the most appropriate yeast my LHBS had in stock. I hope it goes well in my Dead Guy clone I'm making as it should finish malty and a little sweet.

Thanks for the advice!

 

[NordeastBrewer77]

step away from the starter. let it ferment out completely before cold crashing. if it doesn't get going again, it may be due to the stress of cold crashing during active fermentation and you'd be advised to make a new starter, ferment in out completely, and then prepare to pitch.

 

[H-ost]

Well making a starter isn't just to wake the yeast up and get them ready for work it is also to check the viability of your yeast hopefully preventing you from throwing a bad packet/vial into your brew.

Maybe you just got some crappy yeast and luckily you found out in this stage rather than trying to troubleshoot a non-fermenting batch later?