Made my second brew yesterday, the Shining Star Pale Ale kit actually. but instead of using the Wyest 1056, I used White Labs California Ale.
First time I’ve ever used White Labs yeast, my local homebrew store told me I wouldn’t need to make a starter since the starting gravity was 1.044
Brewed yesterday, chilled everything down, when the wort was 70 degrees I shook up the White Labs yeast and pitched it. 18 hours later still no activity on the air lock.
Should I wait longer before I start to worry about possibly losing this batch?
Don’t worry it will most likely start today. What was the date on the vile? The older the yeast the longer it will take to get going. Just in case you may want to have a pack of dry yeast ready to go, but I wouldn’t even think of adding it until the 30-35 hr mark.
I have some US-05 in the fridge ready to go if needed. So essentially if I wake up Monday morning and still nothing going on, pitch the US-05 and all should be good?
I know this is an old thread, but I had sort of had a similar experience. I think it was 20 hours before any activity started for me with this yeast. I was worried because most brews I have done usually start over night, which make me happy when I wake up and see a nice krausen. However this time with WLP001 I woke up to nothing, and I had no spare yeast to re-pitch. Anyway, by the time I got home from work it was raging. Now I am 5 days into the primary and still see quite a bit of activity.
This is my questions for anyone: I still have a huge head of foam at the top of my fermenter. I kinda expected this to fall back in by now. Anyone else have this experience.
Have 2 questions for you brew masters. First is what is a good room temperature range for fermentation and second is I received a liquid yeast pack that appears it might have been “smacked” in transit. It’s been in the frig since it arrived. Still usable or no? Thanks much.
Active fermentation is going to raise the temp. by as much as 10 degrees beyond room temp. In a 70* room, you would be fermenting at 75 - 80. Mid 60s is much better. Room temp in the 50s would get you there, but there are other ways to lower your beer temp. A fridge with an external controller, or a swamp cooler, which is a large tub of water. You use bottles of ice to control the temp.
Don’t worry about the yeast, sometimes they swell in shipping. Even if it has been smacked, it won’t affect the quality.
Djg’s, sometimes the surface tension will not allow the krausen to fall easily. You can just rack from underneath it to your bottling bucket. Or, gently swirl the carboy/pail. This should break that tension and allow the frausen to fall in a couple of days.
Sargedog, see my signature line for pictures of ways to keep the temps in line.
