Is my viability really 0%?

[Marcarm]

After a bit of a cockup with my geterbrewed order, I finally received my wyeast 2000 yesterday.

Was going to start building a multi step starter for a planned lager, but after using yeastcalc and Mr. Malty, they both say my viability is 0%.

This is the first time I've done this, the date on the pack is 1/4/15.

I'm getting a refund for my order, so in theory I'm getting the yeast for free so I'm not sure if I can really complain, but the lager is for my brother in law at Xmas so I want to get it right.

 

[MyQul]

Yeast calculalators aren't always exactly right but the viability will be pretty low. However I think there may be some viable cells in there.

What I would do (and what I was going to to with a couple of 6 month out of date wyeast smack packs that my LHBS gave me for free but I never got round to doing) would be to treat it as if your bottle culturing a yeast. The yeast out of the bottom of a bottle is has a very low viability and vitatality but is easily cultured back up to a pitchable amount. So I think you could do this with your smakpak. Here's how I've bottle cultured yeast up before

http://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=53567

 

[Marcarm]

I tried a 2l starter purely for the sake of time, and had no activity that I could see. No bubbling or krausen, although I do have a 2cm layer on the bottom of the Demi. Didn't get anything in the way of swelling in the smack pack either :-(

Going to make a pseudo lager instead, or get some dried mangrove jack lager yeast, haven't fully decided yet but got two weeks before the fridge is free, so plenty of time to decide properly.

 

[MyQul]

I tried a 2l starter purely for the sake of time, and had no activity that I could see. No bubbling or krausen, although I do have a 2cm layer on the bottom of the Demi. Didn't get anything in the way of sweeping in the smack pack either :-(

Going to make a pseudo lager instead, or get some dried mangrove jack lager yeast, haven't fully decided yet but got two weeks before the fridge is free, so plenty of time to decide properly.

Reckon you were to impatient. I think you would have needed a 250ml stater of 1.020 just to wake any available cells up and then stepped up from there. 2L at I presume 1.040? would have been too much for any available cells to handle I think

 

[Marcarm]

Most probably, not too worry, I got the yeast free anyway, all I lost was 200g of dme.

I'll consider it a practice run for when I do yeast starters properly

 

[MyQul]

Ah, well. Nothing really lost then if you got the smakpak for free.

 

[Marcarm]

Typically there seems to be some action in the starter, the wort has changed colour considerably from really dark to quite light, there is a krausen ring and what appears to be some thick krausen about 1cm thick on top.

Still not convinced there would be enough yeast to ferment a lager so may just cut my losses on it.

 

[MyQul]

Typically there seems to be some action in the starter, the wort has changed colour considerably from really dark to quite light, there is a krausen ring and what appears to be some thick krausen about 1cm thick on top.

Still not convinced there would be enough yeast to ferment a lager so may just cut my losses on it.

afaik Lagers need a lot more yeast than ales (iirc almost double the amount) You could always measure how much you've got and use a yeast calculator to see if you've got enough. It's typically 1.2bl cells per ml

 

[Marcarm]

How would I know how much I have and how many cells it contains?

 

[MyQul]

What did you make the starter in. Get an identical whatever it was. Then fill it with water to the exact same level as the yeast sediment (you'll just have to eyeball it as best you can). Then measure in ml how much water you have then times that by 1.2 that gives you how many billion yeast cells you have

 

[Marcarm]

Thanks, will have a look tomorrow.