Question on my yeast wash

[molc]

So,
I've done a wash but I can't seem to find my yeast...

I bottled over the weekend and decided to wash my WLP001 from the trub at the bottom of the primary, which was left for 3 weeks. This is the second wash for this yeast. You'll see the full contents of the trub in the picture posted, mixed with about 1 litre of boiled water and the top half poured into the smaller jars after about 1 hour.  This has now sat in the fridge for 1 day.

Where's my lovely creamy yeast layer? Is it the foam floating on the top?

[ferg]

yeah I'm pretty sure it's the thin white layer between the diluted beer on the top and the trub on the bottom.

[molc]

That's pretty damn thin. I gave it a little shake this morning and I'm seeing some of the foam that's floating on top breaking apart and settling. It's almost like the yeast it top fermenting again, though I have no idea how that's possible on something that was sitting in primary for 3 weeks.

I'm just confused as I washed before and got nice thick layers of yeast quite quickly.

[brian_c]

Just an observation, but have you sealed those containers? I'd be worried that if a fermentation has kicked off you would build up a bit of pressure, which wont be pretty on opening.

[molc]

I'm opening them each day. There's a decent puff of pressure each time, but nothing explosive yet. I've left one closed before with ChemiPro doing it's business and eventually I started hearing hissing around the rubber seals. Looks like if the pressure gets high enough, it finds a way out.

[brian_c]

Way ahead of me.

[Dodge]

what you have is a very thin layer of creamy yeast on top of yeast and trub mixture. Ive had mixed results with yeast rinsing where some gave nice separation and others just like yours.

You could rinse again if you wanted to. Shake up the jar to re suspend all yeast and trub and allow to settle for 10-15 mins and collect the top portion. Again any heavy deposits in the trub and easy flocculating yeast will settle first. Keeping just the top portion.

It can be hard to get a thick layer of just yeast even with a lot of rinsing. Having a bit of trub in there is no harm. When ready to use again, unless just after rinsing id make a starter with that slurry

[molc]

Sounds like a plan. I had kinda decided to go that direction as well today, but it's nice to hear someone else say the same.

The original jar that I used for this yeast had very little as well, but once I made a starter it reproduced like crazy. The resulting beer was pretty damn tasty

[David]

I usually make a larger starter than needed usually around a liter. I then split it in to 2 jars let settle for a couple of days. The liquid is then decanted off the top leaving enough to swirl and pour into 50ml vials. Usually end up with about 15 ml of fairly clean yeast. Far easier than washing.