"I made this thread here just cause its a general place and this is really just a general kinda thing. This is a stir plate I built to use with liquid yeast (you know to make a starter). Liquid yeast really needs a starter because the packs are really low in terms of cell population. They say you need 300,000 cells to start with and the liquid packs only have 100,000 or so, so a starter is just a really good practice to get into. With dry yeast its the re-hydration that helps get it going.
Anyway here ya go and maybe you can use some of this to build youself one."

"Here she is whirling away and if that was wort she'd be growing lots of sister cells gettin ready for the fermenter.

This is just starting to grow a starter"

"This is a inside look an the workings. Its a computer fan motor with computer hard drive magnets (rare earth magnets) because those are the strongest you can get -- so I've read. The llight is on and its turning like it would if it were closed and spinning.
"

Heeler your gizmo seems large enough not to add heat to the bottle it is stirring. I had purchased the smallest cheapes stirrer i could find on ebay. It worked fine but the tiny thing got warm after running for an hour and added heat to the starter bottle. so i stopped using it.

I like to run a starter bottle with proper neutrients etc for 8 hours. I start it in the morning before i start the mash or hours before i prepare the sugar wash.

"
I remember now why I added the rheostat....you must start the turning as slow as possible and then slowly turn up the speed to creat the vortex which in turn brings o2 into the solution. If you turn it on and its in high gear it will throw the stir bar ...no bueno!!!"

"Well I dont think it will hurt anything but not quite sure what its there for, well...... I guess it cant hurt. If you are useing dry yeast remember we are just re-hydrating not growing or feeding.
Now with liquid yeast then the added nutrient may be useful but its not normally dont that way."

"
this is the inside of the box and I added it just to show the workings
you can see the magnets glued on the fan and the stir bars resting up top."

Hi heeler,
I ordered all the stuff to build your cigar box stirrer yesterday. Should be building it soon.
Thanks, Maddawgs

"Oh and the plug is just a cell phone charger transformer I think we all have a dead cell phone. When you get a fan motor plug in the transformer and touch the wires to the plug and if if doesn't turn rotate the wires. (one inside and one outside) I found that the wire with the lettering on it is the hot (if that matters to you) The little rheostat is a must.
With a flask selection they all say use a erlynmyer but in my case I found that the bottom is not flat like they say and the stir bar would not stay in place."

Yup, I have a ton of cell phone chargers just laying around and I already had a cigar box
Maddawgs