Sparged specialty grains

[Marcus]

I recently brewed on oatmeal stout extract kit. After steeping the specialty grains I rinsed them with two gallons of hot water. Could this cause my original gravity reading to be higher? The kit called for an OG of 1.057. My first reading was 1.076.

[hd4mark]

If you topped up the volume to five gallons (assuming it was a 5 gallon kit) and used the ingredients supplied then your OG should be very close to what the kit says.

It is possible the wort did not get mixed with the top up water and you got an inaccurate reading but in that case it usually reads low. Have you used the hydrometer before or tried it in water to see if it reads about 1.00?

If it was a kit, you followed the instructions and used all the ingredients it's likely to come out OK anyway. Tell us how things went and we can help.

[Marcus]

I have used a hydrometer before. This is only the 4th batch I’ve brewed though. The last beer I made was a Helles extract kit from the same supplier and my OG reading was right on. With this kit I did a full boil. I started with 5 gallons then topped off with distilled water after it cooled. I only had to add about a half gallon though to get back to 5 gallons. I used a dry packet of safeale s04 and within a day it was bubbling so hard I had to take off the airlock and switch to a blow off tube.

[squeegeethree]

Specialty grains typically are not that fermentable. What were they and their amounts?
Also no need to wait for the wort to cool to top off. In fact I would say topping off as soon as possible helps cool the wort down faster.