Conan yeast

[Cain Harland]

Can we get Conan yeast in NZ. If so whats it calling its self.

[Peter Smith]

I used 1272 as a house yeast for about 18 months and really liked it.   Its very clean but does add a definite yeast profile that agree's with my taste.   I have been trying 090 for the last few months,   its fast but it needs to be kept warm IMHO needs 18.5+ - 20, don't start it at 15-16C like 1272 can handle.  Look at the spec's and the suppliers agree...   For me this is a bit limiting as my garage is often too cold for 090 in winter without heating.  The kegged 090 beers have been great,  it seems to clump well in bottom of bottle like 1272 does as well.  If you leave a keg of 1272 for 6 weeks at 2C   it looks like filtered beer.

I never had any luck with 1272 in darker beers.... go figure, I used 007 about 2 years back in a series of beers,   its a great yeast if you are doing stouts / darker beers and you want them to finish quite dry and clean , its good for IPAs as well.  Its pretty clean, It doesn't give the type of classic best bitter/ESB type ester profile that say 1469 gives.   I am trying Bedford bitter at the moment in an ESB, then a smash ale.

I hear that sawmill is using 1272 for many beers now, and know that other small breweries use 1272 as well.   I have a few more pitches of 090 to try but I am thinking about moving back to 1272.    

So my own preference would be 

1272 for all IPA/Pale Ales/Smash beers

007 or Notty for darker beers where you want clean finish

1469 for classic english beers where you want esters

Lagers are interesting as I have WLP830 German Lager, Wyeast 2042 Danish and Wyeast 2001 Urquell beers in pipeline and they are all nice yeasts,  Urquell seems the slowest to finish (takes 3 weeks vs 2 weeks) but the wait seems worth it, its a clean yeast but so is the danish.   I love Saaz hops and the Urquell makes them shine.   The german yeast seems faster to bottle carb if thats how you carb up.

You can read a lot of crap online,   do you own research,  there is a reason why people are using 1272 commercially.  

[Crusader-Rob]

090 is super clean and neutral. similar to US-05 etc. but it flocc's a bit better. i don think this is where your aiming?

1272 havent used, but peter has good experience.

007 is good , floccs well, give a definite ester profile.

1318 is fantastic, i really enjoyed this.

like peter said as well 1469 is also pretty good. probably not your typical hop forward yeast though.

[Cain Harland]

Thanks guys that's really helpful it looks like 90 is out. I read a few reviews saying it has a bit more character than 05 but others like you say very similar so probably not worth losing the convenience of dry yeast to swap.
Dry is a word I've seen associated with 007 a bit so that's probably out for me.
Epic are using 1272 as well.
So at this stage probably just a decision between the estery cloudy 1318 and the cleaner brighter but still a little interesting 1272. Unless someone gives me a rave review of northwest. Will probably try both over the next few brews.

[Crusader-Rob]

I'm actually in a similar boat ATM.

I;'ve used 1318, and I'm quite impressed.

the issue is, here in chch, we dont have ready acces to Wyeast. So I'm trying to figure out a WLP alternative.

[Cain Harland]

Your doing better than me if you have Wyeast in Napier we have 2 shops with yeast one has 04 and the other has 05 and neither turn over enough to be very fresh. It was never a problem with dry yeast to just grab a few packs when ordering the next couple of brews specialty grain but the options there are fairly limited. So the whole idea of finding a house yeast and keeping it going is quite appealing.

[bazza]

how do the 090 go for you. on my first batch it went hard and got the job done. the  4 re-pitches since takes off fast, goes hard to 2 - 3 days then slows right down taking 6 -8 days to get through the last from points to final gravity. I pitch good quantity of yeast at 19 degree after 2 days start ramping the temp to 22 or 23. give the fermented a shake etc to FG. I prefer the flavor to us -05 but fermentation seems to require more management. has anyone expereinced this?

[Che Soffe]

I found wlp095 a real hassle to use. Used 3 times and it stalled twice. Flavour was nice but was painful to use. Wy1318 is a pleasure to use. Very easy to top cop and keep going.

[OzBeer]

Conan is the nickname of Vermont IPA Yeast GY054. 

That yeast is not manufactured by neither WLabs or WYeast, in fact is produced by Giga Yeast, apparently a very small company from San Francisco area.

Now, the problem is that, apparently GigaYeast doesn't export to NZ (Probably to any other country).

So the solution is to go with similar strains from the the bigger players like London Ale III from Wyeast.

I brewed a batch with London Ale III for the first time 10 ago, will give my impressions once the beer is ready.

[Crusader-Rob]

the yeast bay do a conan yeast. as well.

[OzBeer]

Didn't know that, looking at their website they mention a partnership with White Labs - that can potentially help to have that strain in NZ...

[OzBeer]

Interesting post in here: http://www.bear-flavored.com/2012/09/culturing-conan-aka-alchemists...

About harvesting the strain from cans of The Alchemist Heady Topper

[Cain Harland]

If only I could get my hands on a can of heady topper