Guns & Outdoors Forum

jwv2023 wrote: ↑Fri Apr 19, 2024 4:28 pm Every point you have attempted is anecdotal. You can't prove anything with measurements or hard data. Hearsay is hearsay.
Once again I say, if the first 5 rounds go through the same hole, do you still have to break in the barrel?
You just want to be offended.

Everything you have stated is anecdotal. There is a basis in breaking in a bbl that is measurable and quantifiable. You have to take a borescope down the bbl and compare it to a borescope on the same bbl after shooting it. No one does that because was done long ago and its an accepted practice and common sense. However if you were interested, there is the whole WWW that you can search to likely find the info.
If you shoot 5 through the same hole first time out, then no, it doesnt need broken in. You are lucky, or it is used or lapped and have life removed from it.

Some folks who think it is a thing, are those who make custom bbls like Hawk Hill, Bartlien, Christinsen, Criterion, and Kreiger to mention a couple. Kreiger even tells you why to do it even though they lap their bbls. Note the word "premium"
https://www.kriegerbarrels.com/faq#breakin

And 3 more in one vid https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-F_LZRSgTUI&t=529s

So that said, The guy who builds rifles for world class shooters who built mine, premium bbl companies with simple explanations reasoning and data, and world class shooters are telling me that bbl break in is a good thing on one side of the argument and you, a guy who says he pulled a rifle out of a box and one holed a target saying that is isnt a thing on the other.

Ok, you do you, but I just dropped over 700.00 on a bbl that I am told needs breaking in. I am breaking it in. So far the bbl co, the gunsmith and shooters have been dead on what they told me to expect. I am late to this game, but I fell in with heavy hitters who I know are not talking out their 4th point of contact.

Understand, I'm not upset. I am willing to learn. There are a lot of better shooters out their than me. I have had to drop all kinds of preconceived notions to get to the level I am. Bring a fact that is repeatable and measurable and we will see, not an assumption that I cant shoot and a single anecdote that you one holed a target. Facts that are actual rebuttals for the 4 bbl company's information and reasoning I posted.

Weird thing is that I quite often build rifles with cheap green mountain blanks that'll shoot bughole groups first trip to the range. Maybe I'm just doing something right. And to add, they're all heavy barrels after I contour them.

Justsomedude wrote: ↑Sat Apr 27, 2024 4:00 am Weird thing is that I quite often build rifles with cheap green mountain blanks.......

When I was just out of high school, I worked in a retail gun shop. I learned that you always substituted the word inexpensive for the word cheap. Two totally different meanings. Cheap connotes poorly made, inexpensive however connotes good value.
Are green mountain barrels button rifled?

To Varmintmist, of course, I know that my opinions are anecdotal. The OP asked for opinions on barrel break in.
Whenever I post, I do so for the casual reader, maybe a noobie, that doesn't get involved with "insider" conversations for whatever reason. Just looking for some new information. I try to give a lucent and lucid response.
Some top manufacturers and semi custom builders include a "test" target with their rifles. In my case, I have been fortunate to be able to acquire rifles made by Cooper of Montana. All have shot 1/2" out of the box. One 10/22, with a Green Mountain barrel that I installed, shot lights out with Federal Auto Match.
Somehow when I posted you seemed to think I was talking to you. I was trying to impart to that noobie another reasonable view on why a rifle shot better the more you shot it. "Trigger time" not barrel break in. Learning when the trigger broke. Bench technique. These are things that are learned so that down the road when or if things go wrong you can go back to the fundamentals to correct them.
I've always enjoyed reading your posts. It is always interesting to see someone's journey in their endeavors.

I have two Green Mountain barrels.
.260 Rem XP-100 SP
10/22 16” Heavy

Both shoot more than well for hunting firearms. All that’s required of them.

Green Mountain has both button rifled and cut rifling blanks. That's a good point on cheap versus inexpensive. I've actually found more of the big named barrels to have flaws. I always check for bore straightness and have had to send back both Bartlein and Douglas blanks quite a few times because they were a banana. It's hard to describe how to do it, but the bore straightness is measurable and has nothing to do with the OD of the barrel.

Don’t be mistaken. I absolutely love my Lilja and Krieger barrels. Being my first choice in barrels.

The Green Mountain barrels. One came with the XP-100 I purchased used. The other, just seemed the economical choice for a .22lr in a 10/22 that wasn’t to be a match gun.

I’ll be grabbing a couple GM BBCs most likely for some projects coming up. Never had any issues with them. Other than their BBC website kinda blows.


Side note, any load work (switching ANYTHING AT ALL) while “breaking in” a BBC invalidates any improvement in precision one may experience because of “break in”.
Of course it also invalidates the load work, because maybe it got more settled because of break in.

I see what you did there

Its still BBL and I'm not calling him by his personal preferred pronouns either.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJzgmFgylSw

Yep, all of the load work isnt worth the paper its written on. Just a good time to fire form. Figured that out in my own bitty brain.