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PH seems stuck for Lacto

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  • PH seems stuck for Lacto

    Mashed 8 plato wort with 50% wheat and 50% pilsner with some acidulated malt to drop mash PH to 4.8.

    Put into the 2BBL BK and dropped temp to 115 degrees. Starting PH was 4.8

    Had a 2BBL pitchable Lacto from BSI and pitched in at room temp into the 115 degree wort. Put a layer of CO2 on top and sealed up the BK.

    Holding temp at 115 degrees with burner set to auto. After 5 days PH is now down to 3.99. Seems stuck. I'm shooting for 3.6.

    Put 2lbs of crushed Pilsner grain in a sock yesterday and 24 hours later PH is still 3.99.

    BSI is going to send me another pitchabe culture on the house which is very generous of them.

    Any ideas on how to get that last push going on souring? Is there something in the process I did wrong?

    BSI rep said I might have shocked the Lacto by pitching it from 70 degrees to 115. So I plan on bringing up the lacto to 100 degrees before pitching on the new batch.

  • #2
    One more tidbit I'm thinking might be causing a problem. I added the Acidulated malt in at the beginning of mash.

    Would a mash of PH 4.8 for 60 min negatively impact the food lacto can eat? Perhaps a better idea would have been to mash at normal 5.2ish PH and then add the Acid malt in during sparge?

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    • #3
      There's a few possibilities here. 115 seems on the high end for a kettle sour. Some people say that it works for them, but I had similar problems to what your having when I tried that high. Try lowering the temp down to around 95-100 Fahrenheit and see if you can get the lacto working again.

      Another option is that the wort is stratified in the kettle with the top reading higher than the bottom. Try bubbling some CO2 through the bottom and see if mixing changes the pH.

      Don't worry about your mash pH. If you're adding lacto to the kettle, they'll have plenty of available food with no competition from Sacch.

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      • #4
        Yes I agree. 115 seems high. The flame is also probably overshooting a degree or two every time it fires up. You want to stay under 110 and certain strains enjoy different temps.

        Also, BSI has Lacto D, which I don't think drops pH as well as some other strains. You may have better luck with Brevis.

        This might give you more insight: http://www.milkthefunk.com/wiki/File:Lacto108.png

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        • #5
          So I have lowered the temp to 100 and hopefully the 2lbs of crushed Pilsner will inoculate the wort with lacto brevis so I get a more aggressive acidifying of the wort.

          Tomorrow morning I will also bubble co2 and take another ph reading to see if it was stratified

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          • #6
            Well lowered the temp and it took off. Ph about 12 hours after lowering temp was at 3.5. Boiling it to sterile and putting in fermenter. Thanks for the great suggestions!

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