Staged yeast starter?

[Jtd6628]

I am planing on doing a 3 liter Yeast starter. I have seen on YouTube where people do a stepped yeast starter. Doing one liter than 24 hrs later adding another liter of wort, then 24 hrs later adding a 3rd liter of wort to get to 3 liter yeast starter. Are there any notable benefits to this compared to starting with a 3 liter yeast starter to begin with?

 

[Jtvann]

Yes there is. I don't see much need in doing it in 3 phases like that in home brew sizes. Theres an upper limit to how much yeast will grow giving a starter size. For example if making a 5 liter starter if you make a 2L then a 3L it will have much more than just a single 5L.

Theres yeast starter programs that will help decide how to stage them. Mr Malty is one but just about any brewing program will have them.

 

[waldoar15]

I am planing on doing a 3 liter Yeast starter. I have seen on YouTube where people do a stepped yeast starter. Doing one liter than 24 hrs later adding another liter of wort, then 24 hrs later adding a 3rd liter of wort to get to 3 liter yeast starter. Are there any notable benefits to this compared to starting with a 3 liter yeast starter to begin with?

Doing it like that you're trying to grow yeast in an ever increasing alcoholic environment.

Generally speaking, you would crash and decant you first starter then add that yeast to a larger amount of fresh low gravity wort.

 

[VikeMan]

Doing it like that you're trying to grow yeast in an ever increasing alcoholic environment.

Generally speaking, you would crash and decant you first starter then add that yeast to a larger amount of fresh low gravity wort.

There are reasons for crashing/decanting between steps, but not doing that won't create a higher alcohol environment. You could keep adding wort forever without the alcohol from the previous step(s) driving an increase in ABV, because the total volume is increasing along with the alcohol.

 

[Vale71]

There are reasons for crashing/decanting between steps, but not doing that won't create a higher alcohol environment. You could keep adding wort forever without the alcohol from the previous step(s) driving an increase in ABV, because the total volume is increasing along with the alcohol.

You will if you add DME proportionally to the total volume of wort (spent+fresh) and not just to the volume of water you're adding at each step.

If you just add 1l of wort with 90-100g of DME like the OP is proposing to do then basically you're just repeating the 1l step 2 or 3 times and all that is going to achieve is unnecessarily stress the yeast.

 

[VikeMan]

You will if you add DME proportionally to the total volume of wort (spent+fresh) and not just to the volume of water you're adding at each step.

Right. But I don't think he was proposing that.

If you just add 1l of wort with 90-100g of DME like the OP is proposing to do then basically you're just repeating the 1l step 2 or 3 times and all that is going to achieve is unnecessarily stress the yeast.

But if he decants in between his (equal) steps, he'll end up with more cells after 3 steps than after 1 step, because the inoculation rate is increasing each time. It's not the most efficient way to do it though. i.e. the inoculations rate can't be optimal all three times. I'm not sure what happens overall if he doesn't decant...I've never looked at those growth curves (with increasing volume but decreasing gravity for each step).