FastFerment and Saving Yeast?

[pshankstar]

Sorry for what may seem like a silly question but this is new to me and I'm still new to home brewing. I'm curious about saving yeast and reusing it later, but I'm using a conical fermenter (the FastFerment). Everything I read and see (pictures and videos) show how to save it from a glass carboy or bucket and then talks about washing it.

Well looking at my latest brew, it seems to me the yeast appears to already by "washed". Would you all agree with this? If so that's great, I will transfer it to a mason jar soon! Also, I do not have the equipment to make a starter yet (flask, stir plate, etc.,,). So how can I reuse the saved yeast in my next brew without the starter? Can I bring the yeast & stored wort to room temperature & dump it into the new wort when I'm ready to pitch the yeast?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!! Thank you all in advance!!

View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1439350019.367537.jpg

 

[kaconga]

Your best bet would be to use the Mr malty calculator to estimate your cells and go from there. I never wash yeast I plan to reuse.

 

[ferm.adventures]

Yes, you can use without a starter. You can bring the beer/yeast to room temp and pitch. But you might get a little flavor transfer, if you go with that much beer. I'd cold crash and decant off most of the liquid before warming.

That said. Any simple starter, even a little dme in a sanitized growler that is shaken a few times a day is better than no starter. It'll wake up the yeast and it will start to reproduce. Mr malty will give calculations for non stir plate starters as well.

 

[pshankstar]

Yes, you can use without a starter. You can bring the beer/yeast to room temp and pitch. But you might get a little flavor transfer, if you go with that much beer. I'd cold crash and decant off most of the liquid before warming.

That said. Any simple starter, even a little dme in a sanitized growler that is shaken a few times a day is better than no starter. It'll wake up the yeast and it will start to reproduce. Mr malty will give calculations for non stir plate starters as well.

Thanks! Yes I would decant some of the beer off of the yeast before saving it in a mason ja or when I begin the starter. I will have to look into doing a simple starter in a growler.

Does anyone agree or disagree this looks like the yeast is already "washed" and ready to save? I don't see any other layers to make me believe it isn't "washed". Again I'm a newbie and saving yeast is a new step I want to consider trying.

 

[helterscelter]

Is that Ball the First one you put on there? or have you already swapped the ball out once? what does the cone above the ball on your fermentor look like? The reason I ask is that if that is your first ball, you have very little yeast in there. usually the first ball on my ferments is completely full, and even backed up into the cone on the fermentor. I've seen (and read reports of) yeast sticking to the sides of the FastFerment rather than falling all the way into the ball, especially for highly flocculating yeast -- a couple good taps tends to help settle it out into the ball.

I'm no expert on yeast washing, but I've read a lot about it. @WoodlandBrew blog (http://www.woodlandbrew.com/2013/01/yeast-washing-revisited.html) is an awesome resource.

here are a couple other places that are handy to read:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=519995

http://brulosophy.com/2015/03/02/sloppy-slurry-vs-clean-starter-exbeeriment-results/

 

[pshankstar]

Helterscelter, no I have already dumped the ball once. Below is another picture showing the bottom of the conical. It looks as if the yeast (or most of it) has settled. This brew, the first collection ball that I dumped was not full with trub (like my previous brew), but there was a good amount. Given the picture, what are your thoughts?
Also, thanks for the links! I will start reading them tonight!

 

[helterscelter]

Helterscelter, no I have already dumped the ball once. Below is another picture showing the bottom of the conical. It looks as if the yeast (or most of it) has settled. This brew, the first collection ball that I dumped was not full with trub (like my previous brew), but there was a good amount. Given the picture, what are your thoughts?
Also, thanks for the links! I will start reading them tonight!

View attachment 295940

I'd say it looks good for a second-round ball. cold-crash and pour off most of the beer before you measure and re-use it, and as folks have suggested use one of the online calcs to figure out how much to pitch. depending on how much you actually have in that ball you'll probably need to make a starter. (all you really need is a growler/mason jar.. stir plates and such just make it easier)

usually, I collect and re-use yeast from the first ball. I don't know if it's true or not, but I've read that yeast in a secondary tends to be the least flocculant and so by collecting and propagating such yeast you are actually selectively breeding for less-flocculant yeast.. seems to make sense, but I have no idea if it matters.. atleast with the first collection ball, I get LOTS of yeast.

 

[pshankstar]

I'd say it looks good for a second-round ball. cold-crash and pour off most of the beer before you measure and re-use it, and as folks have suggested use one of the online calcs to figure out how much to pitch. depending on how much you actually have in that ball you'll probably need to make a starter. (all you really need is a growler/mason jar.. stir plates and such just make it easier)

usually, I collect and re-use yeast from the first ball. I don't know if it's true or not, but I've read that yeast in a secondary tends to be the least flocculant and so by collecting and propagating such yeast you are actually selectively breeding for less-flocculant yeast.. seems to make sense, but I have no idea if it matters.. atleast with the first collection ball, I get LOTS of yeast.

Thanks, helterscelter you have responded to a few of my posts now! You've been a big help and it's greatly appreciated!! nestar:

I had no idea about the first collection ball vs. the second collection ball and the yeast in it. That makes sense thou! Do you think it's even worth trying to save from the second collection ball and try to use later on? Or just collect it from the first collection on my next brew?

 

[helterscelter]

Thanks, helterscelter you have responded to a few of my posts now! You've been a big help and it's greatly appreciated!! nestar:

I had no idea about the first collection ball vs. the second collection ball and the yeast in it. That makes sense thou! Do you think it's even worth trying to save from the second collection ball and try to use later on? Or just collect it from the first collection on my next brew?

No problem. I'm happy to help. I may not know much, but it feels good to help when I can.

I would definitely try saving it. You won't hurt anything and it is good practice for the future. You could also eventually prove or disprove that flocculation theory if you wanted. Lol.

In the end you'll make beer. Isn't that what it's all about?

 

[AndytheBeave]

hey for what it's worth to the OP, you gotta keep the yeast out of that first ball! That's the good stuff.
I don't have a proper stir plate or flask either but here is what I do to make up for it:
1) on brew day I add a little extra strike water and a little extra sparge water so I can steal 1.5 liters of combined 1st/2nd runnings as my starter wort.
2) I store the reserved starter wort in the fridge until the next day
3) I hold off on my yeast pitch until the day after brewing
4) I cool the boiled wort down over night in either an ice bath or my ferm chamber if there is room
5) On pitch day, I boil the starter wort for 10-15 minutes and take a gravity reading. I try to get it around 1.040 or less and add water if I have to. I kind of use a method inspired by this exbeeriment: http://brulosophy.com/2015/06/29/ye...e-cell-count-vs-vitality-exbeeriment-results/
6) I cool the starter wort down and once it is around 20 Deg C, I add it to a sanitized growler and add the unwashed yeast slurry (as per mr.malty) (this would be out of your first fastferment ball)
8) I then loosely cover the growler with sanitized foil (and poke a few holes in it for oxygen) and shake/swirl it every 30 minutes for about 4 hours and then pitch it into my fermenter.
My fermentation takes off pretty quickly with this method. I always use a good pitch rate though since I am not using a starter to build up the cell count.
So if you don't have all the necessary equipment, it is totally fun to find ways to improvise. I used the extra wort method because the DME that I had lying around had turned into a brick. Literally.

You have pretty nice setup with the fastferment, so you are already off to the races I think.

 

[pshankstar]

Thanks for the suggestion AndytheBeave! I'm not sure how I would be able to keep the yeast out of the first collection ball? The trub, yeast and other sediments is supposed to settle to the ball... Any suggestions on this one? Again, I'm a newbie and I'm open to any and all suggestions.

 

[AndytheBeave]

Get yourself a big sanitized jar and dump it all right in there along with a bit of beer. Once it is in the jar, swirl it around to suspend everything in the slurry to make it pourable. Then you can portion it out amongst several smaller jars. Just make sure everything is well sanitized. I put sanitized foil over the jar(s). My last slurry that I used, I just dumped it all into a big jar and kept it like that.
When you are ready to brew again, use mr.malty (google mr.malty) to calculate how much slurry you need.
Or if you want you can wash it. There are multiple different opinions on washing yeast vs. simply harvesting the slurry.
I have done it both ways and both of them worked great. I suspect that washed yeast will keep longer but I have zero evidence to support that statement.
Earlier in this thread, someone posted a link to the simple yeast storage method. That is the method that I use now.

 

[helterscelter]

Thanks for the suggestion AndytheBeave! I'm not sure how I would be able to keep the yeast out of the first collection ball? The trub, yeast and other sediments is supposed to settle to the ball... Any suggestions on this one? Again, I'm a newbie and I'm open to any and all suggestions.

@AndytheBeave is saying that the yeast which collects in the first ball is the yeast you want to keep/save/re-use.

 

[pshankstar]

@AndytheBeave is saying that the yeast which collects in the first ball is the yeast you want to keep/save/re-use.

Ah ok, that makes sense! :cross: Thank you both again!

 

[mbg]

I know this is an old thread but:

I've used my FF half a dozen times now. I like to harvest yeast so thought the FF with collection ball would make this easier but I'm finding the yeast/trub mix to be impossible to remove without flushing with water and then I watch the yeast go down the drain.

Any suggestions?


Thanks

 

[Shwagger]

I know this is an old thread but:

I've used my FF half a dozen times now. I like to harvest yeast so thought the FF with collection ball would make this easier but I'm finding the yeast/trub mix to be impossible to remove without flushing with water and then I watch the yeast go down the drain.

Any suggestions?


Thanks

Rack to the fastferment, don't pitch yeast, let sit overnight. Dump all that crap that collected in the ball. Reattach clean ball, pitch yeast. You'll have mostly yeast and beer at the end.

I never pitch until the next day after the trub settles out and is dumped. Also allows my ferment chamber to do a lot of the wort cooling. I still run it through a plate chiller first, but just once. After a night, it's at perfect pitch temp

 

[mbg]

Rack to the fastferment, don't pitch yeast, let sit overnight. Dump all that crap that collected in the ball. Reattach clean ball, pitch yeast. You'll have mostly yeast and beer at the end.

I never pitch until the next day after the trub settles out and is dumped. Also allows my ferment chamber to do a lot of the wort cooling. I still run it through a plate chiller first, but just once. After a night, it's at perfect pitch temp

Thanks. I did this on my first FF brew after reading about someone doing it this way but later was told there is a larger chance of infection waiting to add yeast. Maybe that's just "hog-wash."

Mike

 

[Shwagger]

Infection, to me, is just bad cleaning practices and bad sanitation. If it's in a sanitized vessel, air locked, I don't see how it can get infected.

 

[mbg]

Infection, to me, is just bad cleaning practices and bad sanitation. If it's in a sanitized vessel, air locked, I don't see how it can get infected.

Thanks - will try this again next time. Seems way simpler.