Help!!! No sign of fermentation(lager)

[lincolnubrewer]

Hi,

I brewed a german pilsner this past Monday(3/9). OG 1.050. I used 8oz slurry of 3470 with 2 liter starter and pitch Monday around 54-55 degrees and kept temperature 50-52 degree. I know that lager yeast is slower to start up but I didn't see any activity in the airlock for the past 48 hours. I took the lid off and no signs of Krausen. I also took a reading on the hydrometer and it still at 1.050 I did have 2 pack 3470 on hand and pitch the yeast. Did I do the right thing? I'm not sure why the original yeast didn't take off with starter. I did take the slurry from the secondary this past November that I did a bock which turned out well.

 

[stpug]

I think you did a good thing. I suspect the beer would have gotten going on it's own, but no harm in pitching more yeast into a lager (especially since your harvested yeast was fairly old).

 

[ted464]

According to the Mr Malty app, lager yeast harvested that long ago only has a viability of about 10%, pitching new yeast was the way to go.

 

[masaba]

According to the Mr Malty app, lager yeast harvested that long ago only has a viability of about 10%, pitching new yeast was the way to go.

There was a recent post on the front page of Homebrewtalk that says the half life of slurry stored in the fridge is 3 months (e^(-t/150)), therefore, viability of yeast harvested in November is ~45%.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/woodland-brewing-comany-simple-yeast-storage.html

I personally think that Mr. Malty is overly conservative on a lot of brewing aspects.