7 replies to this topic

[CarlosM]

So I want to brew tomorrow depending on the weather. My question is a smack pack of wyeast 1056 Propagator (the large one) enough to ferment a beer of an OG of 1.048? its an Irish Red if any one cares.

[Slainte]

The pitching rate is a little low for a 5 gallon batch, I would make a starter since you have plenty of time.You might be fine without it though...but I wouldn't do it.As a general rule, you want 0.75 million cells per mL of wort per degree plato for ales, and double that for lagers.The smack packs contain roughly 100 billion cells.

[stellarbrew]

Assuming it's a 5 gallon batch, the yeast count is not optimum, but in my opinion, it will work fine.

[CarlosM]

its the activator the big one. I always screw up the name.

[CarlosM]

The pitching rate is a little low for a 5 gallon batch, I would make a starter since you have plenty of time.You might be fine without it though...but I wouldn't do it.As a general rule, you want 0.75 million cells per mL of wort per degree plato for ales, and double that for lagers.The smack packs contain roughly 100 billion cells.

i just read the package it says its good for beers up to 1.060 wow thats a relief. I havent brewed in 6 months so I forgot most of the small mathematical things.

[NWPines]

What volume, 5 gal? How old is the smack pack (what was the packaging date)? Ideally, you'd want to pitch about 170 billion cells for 5 gal of 1.048 wort. A 4 week old smack pack will have about 80 billion cells. So definitely not ideal, but it will still make beer. You just might get a bit more ester production than you might want.To get a better idea of recommended pitching rates, check out:https://www.mrmalty.com/calc/calc.html

[zymot]

Assuming it's a 5 gallon batch, the yeast count is not optimum, but in my opinion, it will work fine.

+1Not textbook optimum cell count. But yeast fresh from Wyeast and given the wake up of a smack pack, no one could tell you the difference.zymot

[3rd party JKor]

Make a starter if you can, otherwise, just pitch what you got.