wyeast yeast pack swollen when received

[Shawn]

quick example...if I put my wort volume to 4 Gs instead of 5, my starter is reduced from 1.7L to 1.03L, which would make a combined total of 5 Gs.

Heh? Sorry... I don't follow. Were you going to make, for your total batch of beer, 4 gallons? If you were going to do the typical 5 gallon (19 L) batch, you'd have to leave it at 5 gallons on mrmalty.

For your other questions, some people insist on washing yeast, and some people just pitch it. If it's going to be the same type of beer, and as you said, the same recipe, you're probably ok not washing it. I personally wash the yeast if I'm going to re-use slurry, but I've never followed up with an identical recipe before. You said IPA, right? If there's a lot of hops involved in the recipe, you'll have more hop gunk left in the trub (if you're using pellets, that is), so you'd have to keep in mind that the slurry left behind after racking your beer will have a lot of non-yeast material.

[fakr]

Sorry for the confusion, I think I'm the one confused.  I've never made a 2 liter yeast starter before.  Sounds like a lot to dump into 23 liters of wort.  I thought I'd have to reduce the volume of wort so that after adding the 2 liter pitch I would end up with a total of 23 litres.
From your response Shawn, the above is not the case.  I'll plug in the volume I'm fermenting and add the appropriate amount of yeast starter.

Thanks for the advice on the hops and washing.  I'll keep that in mind for sure.

[Shawn]

If you DID decide to dump in 2 L of starter, you still wouldn't need to take it into account for the total volume, since technically you'd be dumping in already-fermented wort (fermented from the yeast put in there to build up their volume and numbers).

Personally, if it's over 1 L, I always put the starter in the fridge for a couple of days before brewday (after it has fermented out)... this way, the yeast will floc out and settle, and on brewday you can take it back out of the fridge to bring up to pitching temps, and decant off most of the liquid, so you're pitching mostly yeast, instead of yeast + 2 L of fermented wort.

[fakr]

perfect, thanks Shawn.  Thats exactly the info I was looking for.

[Richard]

by the way, I'm making the exact same IPA over the next 4 or 5 batches, with the exception of changes in hops.  the OG shouldn't be more than 1.045 max.

Make a starter; pitch your first IPA; wash + bottle/can the yeast for further pitchings, do starter for each of those; rinse, repeat.

Since you're planning on making an IPA, I'm suggesting you wash 'cause you might carry over hop particles in trub from one batch to another - might end in some grassy notes. Or it might not, it's more of a precaution

[fakr]

Will do.  if nothing else, I'll get practice making starters and collecting yeast.

[Gil Breau]

1056 is almost always swollen

It has to do with the specific yeast propogation and the packaging of it. I dug around for a week to find that out.

It's harder to find the little smack pack, but once you pop it, you'll see really fast how well it swells.