Yeast Washing Question

[infectedbrew]

I finally did my first yeast wash yesterday and I did the typical 4 jars, to 2 jars, but when I finished moving everything into the 2 jars, I decided to combine 2 of the original 4 into one just to see my results, and its pretty interesting what has come out.

What do you guys think, do I look ok after my first shot at this?

The jar with less liquid I already decanted some off the top already, but that is the jar that I combined 2 of my original into 1.

 

[WoodlandBrew]

See here for a microscope assessment of a very similar process:

http://www.woodlandbrew.com/2013/01/yeast-washing-revisited.html

 

[infectedbrew]

So if I'm reading that article correctly that means that all 3 of my jars has more then enough viable cells to use for my next batch?

I did the usual add water to bucket, swirl, let sit, and then poured off 4 jars from the spigot on the bucket. It left a lot of dark trub on the bottom of the bucket.

 

[WoodlandBrew]

That could be right. It's hard for me to tell from the picture how much yeast is there. The larger partials of trub seem to settle out, but the smaller ones don't.

 

[infectedbrew]

That could be right. It's hard for me to tell from the picture how much yeast is there. The larger partials of trub seem to settle out, but the smaller ones don't.

I'll try and upload more pictures later on.

 

[infectedbrew]

Heres more pics

 

[infectedbrew]

So any new feedback?

 

[ScrewyBrewer]

For long term storage of my washed yeast, several weeks to several months, I make sure to fill the jars up to the very top to eliminate airspace. Figure on about a 10% viable cell loss per month per jar too, this is a good way to know what type of starter you'll need to make, step or standard and what size.

I use a sanitized turkey baster to put the compacted yeast cake into smaller bottles the yeast originally shipped in, they hold about 100 billion cells when full. Before transferring the compacted yeast to the smaller vials I let the washed yeast cold crash in a half gallon jar in the refrigerator for two or three days.

After cold crashing the vials of yeast for a few days the yeast will compact even more, it's hard to package washed yeast as densely as the manufacturer, sometimes two vials of washed yeast are needed to get near the 100 billion cell count but that is easily done by eye.