Yeast Starter Plan

[Borneogoat]

I'm new'ish to liquid yeast and the amount of conflicting info on the web about starters is driving me in circles. I'd like to check my yeast plan for this weekend's brew with y'all.

I've got: Wyeast Activator 3787, Yeast Forge heated stir plate, 2L flask, light DME, yeast nutrients, O2 setup, and a Belgian Ale recipe of 1.061 OG.

1. Remove yeast pack from fridge and let warm to room temp.
2. Break internal pack and let the whole pack swell. How long? Hours, days? Temp?
3. Sanitize flask and make wort of about 1.040 with DME. Beersmith suggests about 1.75L in my case.
4. Add wort to flask. Should I add yeast nutrients? Should I add some O2?
5. Add yeast from swollen smack pack.
6. Start gentle stir and regulate temp. What temp? Same as my intend fermentation temp, around 68F?
7. Cover with foil and let her ferment away. About 24-48hrs?
8. Stop stirring just before pitching to fermenter with wort. Decant watery stuff, just use slurry at the bottom, right? I could pitch the whole thing, but I'm near the limits of my fermenter's capacity.

How does this sound, anything else?
Thanks in advance for the help...

 

[bbrim]

Pull yeast from fridge and slap it right away. In 4-6 hours it will be swollen and ready to go.
If you go 1.75L in a 2L flask on the stir plate, in my experience, it is going to foam out but this has never resulted in an infection so I don't worry about it.
I use homebrewdad.com for my starter volumes.
I don't worry too much about the temp (maybe I should).
There is no need to add O2 because the stir plate will take care of this.
If the yeast is fresh 24 hours should do but make it 48 hours out (or more if not fresh) because you will need to turn the stir plate off a while before decanting. If you don't give it time to settle then all the less flocculant cells will get dumped and the cells left behind will be those more inclined to drop fast.

Good luck and have fun!

 

[RedlegEd]

Hi. Good questions. Rather than try to answer them for you, read this link on yeast starters. Matt does a great job of laying it out. Once you get used to that, I'd recommend you take a serious look at using a Vitality Starter. I use this method, and it's really worked well for me. Good luck!

[Edit] BTW, don't forget to sanitize your stir bar as well!

 

[Borneogoat]

That is a good link, distills down the basics well. I've tried a handful of different yeast calculators: Mr Malty, Beersmith, Home Brew Dad, etc. All give different numbers. I'm going to use the directions on Brulosophy and a 1.5L starter, as it seems a good average of all the references.

Last question, hopefully: If I'm adding candi syrup during primary after high krausen, should I calculate yeast required using the SG into the fermenter post-boil (1.050) OR the total SG after the extra sugar is added (1.061)?

 

[jerbrew]

Total sg going into your fermenter. Once the yeast get going you'll have enough to take care of that added sugar