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Author Topic: Pitching Rates: Wyeast vs Mr. Malty  (Read 12896 times)

Offline hoser

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Re: Pitching Rates: Wyeast vs Mr. Malty
« Reply #15 on: October 25, 2011, 10:05:27 am »
I have also found that pitching an "active" starter gives better results because the yeast is ramped up and ready to go.  I like to make up a starter according to mrmalty.com.  Let it ferment out. Then chill.  On brew day decant and add 1L of my wort to the decanted yeast.  Get both my wort and yeast at the near the same temp so there is no schock.  Then once the yeast is "active" (usually after 2-3 hours), pitch it into my oxygenated wort.

Offline James Lorden

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Re: Pitching Rates: Wyeast vs Mr. Malty
« Reply #16 on: October 25, 2011, 10:39:43 am »
Agreed,

I have brewed many batches that and there is only one that I think was over pitched - that beer was way better than most underpitched beers that I've tried.

The point - it's always better to err on the side of more.

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Offline bluesman

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Re: Pitching Rates: Wyeast vs Mr. Malty
« Reply #17 on: October 25, 2011, 10:58:51 am »
I have found through my experience that pitching at a rate of .75 million cells/mL/degree plato(+/-5%)  for ales as prescribed by Jamil's calculator has rendered very good results, as opposed to underpitching at a rate of roughly half that (1 vial) for 5 gal of a 50GU beer. The end results speak for the themselves in this regard. This assumes a viable (healthy) yeast pitch.

To accurately count yeast cells, one would need a microscope and a hemocytometer. I am assuming the cell counts on the vial/smack packs are 100 billion cells of viable yeast. This is an assumption one must make when estimating and growing a yeast pitch.

My advice to anyone that's skeptical of Jamil's yeast pitching rate calculation is to do a side by side blind tasting, by splitting an appropriately sized batch of wort and pitching at .375 and .75 million cells/mL/degree plato accordingly. It's amazing the flavor difference. Try it for yourself.
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narvin

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Re: Pitching Rates: Wyeast vs Mr. Malty
« Reply #18 on: October 25, 2011, 12:11:53 pm »

They're also in the marketing and "keeping it easy" business.  

Absolutely.  I made this out of boredom to show the Wyeast simplified pitching rates for ales versus what Mr. Malty uses. You can see that the simplified schedule is not very linear with respect to the gravity of the wort.

« Last Edit: October 25, 2011, 12:19:51 pm by narvin »

Offline nateo

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Re: Pitching Rates: Wyeast vs Mr. Malty
« Reply #19 on: October 25, 2011, 02:44:53 pm »
Absolutely.  I made this out of boredom to show the Wyeast simplified pitching rates for ales versus what Mr. Malty uses. You can see that the simplified schedule is not very linear with respect to the gravity of the wort.

Should the graph be linear? I would expect a graph of the yeast required to get relatively steeper as the gravity increases, due to increasing osmotic pressure and decreasing wort O2 absorption.
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narvin

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Re: Pitching Rates: Wyeast vs Mr. Malty
« Reply #20 on: October 25, 2011, 03:02:25 pm »
Should the graph be linear? I would expect a graph of the yeast required to get relatively steeper as the gravity increases, due to increasing osmotic pressure and decreasing wort O2 absorption.

Maybe not, but I think it should be constantly increasing as gravity increases.  3 fixed pitching rates seems like an oversimplification.

I do know that pitching a single pack of yeast in 1.060 wort gives me results that I don't like for most styles, which makes me think that this is all about marketing a product to the widest audience possible.  The yeast companies know that people who care about exact pitching rates will make a starter regardless of what they say.

Offline nateo

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Re: Pitching Rates: Wyeast vs Mr. Malty
« Reply #21 on: October 25, 2011, 03:09:34 pm »
I do know that pitching a single pack of yeast in 1.060 wort gives me results that I don't like for most styles,

I agree, and fwiw I use Mr Malty all the time. I just wonder if a pitching rate curve that looked more like f(x) = x^3 would be more appropriate. That's just my gut feeling, with no facts to back that up.
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Offline corkybstewart

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Re: Pitching Rates: Wyeast vs Mr. Malty
« Reply #22 on: October 25, 2011, 03:45:17 pm »
What throw a lot of people off about mrmalty is the volumes he uses: for a lager you need a 3 gallon starter for instance.  Who wants to pitch a 3 gallon starter into 5 gallons of beer?  I know that I'm going to pour the liquid off and just use the slurry but that's what initially turned me away from using hi calculators.
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Offline bo

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Re: Pitching Rates: Wyeast vs Mr. Malty
« Reply #23 on: October 25, 2011, 04:13:58 pm »
You don't need a 3 gallon starter for 5 gallons of beer.

Offline nateo

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Re: Pitching Rates: Wyeast vs Mr. Malty
« Reply #24 on: October 25, 2011, 04:31:25 pm »
What throw a lot of people off about mrmalty is the volumes he uses: for a lager you need a 3 gallon starter for instance.  Who wants to pitch a 3 gallon starter into 5 gallons of beer?  I know that I'm going to pour the liquid off and just use the slurry but that's what initially turned me away from using hi calculators.

Yeah I don't know of any calculator that does stepped starters well, which is really what you'd want to do if making a very large starter. I do those calculations by hand. Sean Terrill has a workaround using the mrrmalty rates on his website.
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Offline tom

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Re: Pitching Rates: Wyeast vs Mr. Malty
« Reply #25 on: October 25, 2011, 05:02:52 pm »
You don't need a 3 gallon starter for 5 gallons of beer.
Well, that is oversimplified at best.  A 2 qt starter is recommended for a regular strength ale and 4 qt for a lager.  Twice that for a 1.080 beer.  And more the higher you go.  And that's with fresh yeast.  I always pitch a "5 gallon starter" for my >1.100 beers and I am happy with the results.  YMMV.
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Offline davidgzach

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Re: Pitching Rates: Wyeast vs Mr. Malty
« Reply #26 on: October 26, 2011, 06:42:50 am »

Here's a "must read" article on yeast pitching: http://www.byo.com/component/resource/article/1749-yeast-pitching-rates-advance-homebrewing

Excellent article.....
Dave Zach

Offline Thirsty_Monk

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Re: Pitching Rates: Wyeast vs Mr. Malty
« Reply #27 on: October 26, 2011, 05:46:18 pm »
Back to the price. My expert recoments to pitch 1 liter per one BBL of 1050 lager.
This translates to 5 liters of slurry that I need to buy. With shipping it is almost $500.

So if you do a little math you can find out that is expert recommendation for 5 gal or 10 gal batches.
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Offline morticaixavier

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Re: Pitching Rates: Wyeast vs Mr. Malty
« Reply #28 on: October 27, 2011, 08:52:19 am »
Back to the price. My expert recoments to pitch 1 liter per one BBL of 1050 lager.
This translates to 5 liters of slurry that I need to buy. With shipping it is almost $500.

So if you do a little math you can find out that is expert recommendation for 5 gal or 10 gal batches.

according to that pitching rate you need 156.25 ml for a 5 gallon batch of 1.050 lager. That's not a lot more than 2 smack packs or vials if you call the vial approx .5 actual yeast. If that measure is for the whole volume than that means a little over one pack or vial to 5 gallons. interesting! unless it's not a linear relationship.
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Offline a10t2

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Re: Pitching Rates: Wyeast vs Mr. Malty
« Reply #29 on: October 27, 2011, 11:06:55 am »
Back to the price. My expert recoments to pitch 1 liter per one BBL of 1050 lager.
This translates to 5 liters of slurry that I need to buy. With shipping it is almost $500.

I don't know where you're getting the yeast, but BSI was charging me a little more than half that. It might be worth giving them a call.
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