“You must break in your barrel!” Really?

[Draco]

Way back there, 60's and 70's, bench rest shooters would break their barrels in by coating a few bullets with Simichrome polish and shooting them through the barrel. They said it took the burrs off the lands. Who knows but I've done it on a couple guns that would not perform and it helped them immensely.

[fish4food]

this needs bumped

suck on that christensen

[Lost10mm]

Hey man, your pencil left some lead on the paper

Good shooting. That's pretty impressive based on what I've seen on a typical range day.

[billfromtx]

That’s not a hunting rifle lol. 20+ lbs

I didn’t see a weight.

[kck]

Yes, Proof barrels are lapped as are almost all, if not all, custom barrels. No, you do NOT need to break in a hand lapped barrel. BUT, you will be breaking in the throat that the reamer cuts. When I chamber a barrel, I sneak up on the last few thou of the throat to ensure that those final cuts leave the least amount of sharp edge and burr possible (burr is a very strong word to use) but your first shots will start to smooth out that transition from the throat to the lands. If cut carefully, you should notice very little, if any, issue with accuracy in those first shots. Off the rack stuff will tend to have more of an issue due to inferior barrels and reamers that get used within an inch of their life. This needs to be mentioned as well...the crown of a barrel is just as important and you can break in, shoot, clean, blah, blah all you want but if your crown sucks then your gun sucks. Any GS worth his/her salt will indicate that bore to within .0002 or less and cut that crown proper for consistent bullet release every time so don't go banging up a good crown trying to clean and "break in" a nice gun. Cut rifled all day over button pull...sorry, just had to throw that jab in.

Matt, nice shootin' by the way!!!

[Txarrowhunter]

Nice shooting. Some barrels come lapped from factory. Christensen from my experience and many others is hit or miss pun intended!

[Lynn21]

I agree totally. Break in what??? That’s been a dam myth forever. Reminds me of “hecs” crap.

[JakeGraves]

I clean a new barrel with gun scrubber and then after about 150 rounds. After that clean after every match so 250-300 rounds.
I tried to do a barrel break in a long time ago before I knew any better, lol.

[Rubberdown]

But you missed...

Haha. Just kidding! Good shootin!

[chillymac]

just think how much better it would have shot if you had broke it in properly!