I know this has probably been brought up before but I have to ask. I recently bought a new Kimber Montana in 300WSM and here is my question. For years I owned many rifles that never had any kind of proper barrel break in done to them and they performed flawlessly for many years with great accuracy, simply because I was unaware that this(barrell break-ins) was done. I have in the last few years done proper barrel break in on a couple guns. I have talked to many gunsmiths about this and what I have been told in whole is that the only reason to do a true 1 shot clean and so on barrell break in is simply to condition the barrell for long term cleaning. That it has nothing to do with accuracy or anything else.Can someone give me some insight and even their opinions on whether this is truly neccessary or just a precarious myth.I have found many articles from McMillan where he absolutely bashes the theory on barrel break in. If you search for articles and threads on this stuff across the internet you get hundreds of different opinions and procedures on this topic. To me after having done a proper break in and not having done proper break ins, my conclusion is that it doesn't make any difference. I always thorougly clean a new gun before going to the range with it and always thoroughly clean the rifle on return from the range but some of my best sub MOA rifles have never seen a break in so it puzzles me on all this.

AlaskaCub,

I don't have any answers for you but, I do find this to be a very interesting topic as well.

I have several rifle projects (using cut rifle barrels) in the works and certainly want to 'break in'
(or not) the barrels using the absolute best process for both accuracy & longevity.

The best or at least most common sense approach I have found on this subject is outlined in the article
below. I particularly like the idea of burnishing a barrel as outlined by Mike Rock. It makes alot more
sense to me than the shoot, clean, shoot, clean process......


Barrel break in


Regards,
Dave

Thanks, that was very interesting.

I have always wished someone would give me a valid reason that proper break-in was a myth and waist of time. It is a royal pain in the ass!!!! But, if I pay the money to have a custom barrel twisted on one of my rifles, I am going to go through what ever process they recommend to get the best preformance. I hate it but I do it!

So do we break in the new barrel or not? Is it neccessary or not?
Old Timer

No they are saying not to break it in. Well what gets me thinking is that like I stated earlier in my initial post, I have guns that will shott sub moa that I bought years ago, cleaned it real well when I got home from the store and then took a box of ammo to the range and shot it. Never knew anything about breaking in a barrell. I shoot and then let the barrel cool down make scope adjustments and shoot some more. When i get home i clean it real well oil it and put it away. If I did this for so many years and it worked why all of a sudden in the last 2 years have I been coerced into thinking that this so called break in is going to do something special for the gun. It was fired at Kimber that I can tell from looking down the pipe and while cleaning it. It showed signs of powder and copper in the barrel. Did they break it in when they fired it? No they did not. I think its more of a guilt trip I go through with a new gun than anything else. A little guy on your shoulder telling you, "you know you should break it in, you paid a lot of money for it and isn't proper barrel break in what they say to do". Its all hogwash if you ask me and I am not falling into it this time. Its not an issue of laziness i just hate sheep like behavior in life. I dont like doing something just because thats what say you should do I have a habit of asking why!

Alaskaclub,
I have a new Kimber in 300wsm, I went to the range a couple of days ago shot two groups with Winchester 180 pp factory into .335 three shot and a 5 shot group of .71 which madw me happy and cleaned 1 shot two shot and so on for 40 shots took it out yesterday and the rifle shot 1.25, 1.5 all else being the same but if the rifle shot a third at the factory and with me on the first shooting this last time out must be me or the cleaning, what do you think?
Old Timer

See what I mean the barrel break in procedure is bad for a barrel, no I am just kidding, seriously thats weird though that your groups opened up so much. Were your first series of shots with the tight groups before the one shot clean one method?

I've never read any testing as a controlled experiment to confirm the value of barrel breakin.

Opinions fly like crazy but valid confirmation has escaped this issue completely and as far as I'm concerned, until there's reasonable testing to validate this theory I'm assuming it's all talk!

I don't know, that's for sure. And just because someone makes a good barrel doesn't mean they know either.

After having read David C's link, I thought I "felt" a couple of possibly dodgy opinions.

Well barrels arn't car engines, or we would be injecting oil in there every shot.
Aero piston engines are routinely run for the first 30-50 hours on a very basic oil so that there IS some metal to metal contact, to wear the rings in.

Anyway, as we all have heard before, barrels are not worn out by mere copper or lead scraping against steel, but by the heat of combustion near the chamber, burnish or no.

I have the impression from somewhere that barrel break-in was supposed to be for ease of cleaning over the life of a barrel that was used a lot, like a target rifle.
With stainless and modern copper cleaners this may now not be much of a problem.

For the average hunter its probably not worth worrying about.

But as for being a problem, or wearing a barrel out by breaking in, what's the big deal? The last two I did, while sighting in the scopes, took only about 3, maybe 5 shots with swipes with Sweet's between each.
As advertised, the amount of copper tapered off quickly so I went to 3 shot groups and just soaked in Sweet's while the barrel cooled.

Same while testing various loads for accuracy, so actually the barrel break-in was done while having a sip of coffee, patching targets, etc.
and the best effect may have been keeping the barrel cool, and clean, to start each test group. Heck, piece of cake.

My two worst barrels for copper fouling were 2nd hand, and probably not broken in. No sleep lost either way.

Hello,
Believe it should be mentioned that all barrels are not equal in quality, finish of bore, etc. and it has been my experience that some barrels benefit more from a break in period than others.
The comments about the moly use and the negative aspects of the practice are well known among long term match shooters and many avoid using it in any application.
Match shooters send a great deal more rounds down range than hunters and if the "sporting" rifle is shooting well, normal cleaning keeps the crud and copper out to a minimum, would not worry much about a "break in" period. Now, if the bore is really rough, shoots ok, but leaves a lot of residue and obvious copper fouling, would re consider a break in program. It may be just what is needed to prevent an eventual loss of accuracy. Mr. Tubbs, as well as others, offers a fire lap package and most will tell you it does "clean up" the bore and removes a very tiny bit of metal in doing so, but improves the situation a great deal. Quality of barrel/bore and mfg. varies and having used Shilen, Hart, Douglas, Schneider, factory barrels, Krieger, my personal experience is the Krieger offers the best performance with the smallest amount of "break in." Shoot one stage of 20 shots plus few sighters and it is pretty much ready to serve you well for an extended period of time with just normal cleaning required. I might add that the actual bore of the rifle may not be the area creating the copper build up, but the throat itself is rough sometimes and polishing of the first third of the barrel is helpful in solving the problem. If the barrel shoots well, no big time build up, you are in business!

quote:

Originally posted by OldTimer:
Alaskaclub,
I have a new Kimber in 300wsm, I went to the range a couple of days ago shot two groups with Winchester 180 pp factory into .335 three shot and a 5 shot group of .71 which madw me happy and cleaned 1 shot two shot and so on for 40 shots took it out yesterday and the rifle shot 1.25, 1.5 all else being the same but if the rifle shot a third at the factory and with me on the first shooting this last time out must be me or the cleaning, what do you think?
Old Timer

i think it was the cleaning. i have the exact same rifle, all it does for me is shoot a .3" group, then for ages itll do nothing but 1.5-2" groups then it will do a .3" group again and so on, just a big circle.

What are you saying Paul, that your Kimber shoots much better dirty than it does sueeky clean?

quote:

Originally posted by AlaskaCub:
See what I mean the barrel break in procedure is bad for a barrel, no I am just kidding, seriously thats weird though that your groups opened up so much. Were your first series of shots with the tight groups before the one shot clean one method?

Yes or just at the first of the cleaning, you don't think i hurt the barrel do you? How ould a cleaning hurt the accuracy?

I don't know why but sometimes it does.

I have a .270 that shoots much better dirty than clean.

quote:

Originally posted by AlaskaCub:
What are you saying Paul, that your Kimber shoots much better dirty than it does sueeky clean?

deffinately! between the 5th and 10th shot is where the accuracy is. below 5 its too clean and above 10 its too dirty.

or maybe i flinch for the first 5 shots, then realise it doesnt hurt. do a good group or too, get cocky and starting shooting badly. then realise i am doing this and by that time the recoil from 20 shots has gotten to me so im flinchin again.

just a thought :P!

In my experience a gun never shoots its best squeeky clean. Thats why prior to hunting, once I have the groups that make me happy the barrell doesn't get cleaned again till the season is over.

I look at it this way, it doesn't hurt the barrel to shoot & clean it for the 1st 10 shots, so why not? You have to mount the scope anyway, might as well "break-in" the bbl. while getting on paper. I clean between shot for 10, then 3 shot groups & clean between for 3 groups. Then clean & shoot away cleaning about every 20-30rds.
I also agree w/ AKcub, my rifles all shoot better w/ a fouling shot or two.

I hear ya Fred. But my question is , the gun has already been fired who knows how many times from the factory. So if its been fired what is there to break in? I cleaned the gun very well when I got it home, and I had powder residue and copper in the barrel. Whats the point to do the barrell break in on the second series of firings? I know its not that difficult to do but what am I actually accomplishing by cleaning it after each shot, they didn't do it at Kimber obviously so it cant be that important right?

When I break in a new barrel. I shoot it like any other rifle I own. I fire two rounds let it cool and continue this until all 20 rounds are fired. Then take it home and clean it and remove some copper. I then consider it broke in.

quote:

Originally posted by AlaskaCub:
In my experience a gun never shoots its best squeeky clean. Thats why prior to hunting, once I have the groups that make me happy the barrell doesn't get cleaned again till the season is over.

Well I don't know just how much accuracy you field shooters need, but all I see at shooting matches, where accuracy wins, is blokes cleaning barrels. Cept 22RF anyway.

As for factories doing what is best, have you read of all the faults need fixing on new rifles? Some are vertually unusable, so their not going to worry too much about a barrel that they won't own as soon as you buy it.
But sure, the way many hunters look after their barrrels, any break-in would be gilding the lillie.
I hope your's is stainless. . . How long is your season?

I may be repeating things but here is my 2 cents:

You'll never turn a chicken sh*t barrel into chicken salad but every barrel has a certain potential. As far as an ideal barrel goes; being super slick and smooth down the bore is not necessarily better. A barrel needs to have a certain minor amount of roughness measured in microns that will give carbon something to stick to. In this ideal situation, you are burnishing the barrel w/ a slight amount of carbon fouling which helps prevent copper material from sticking and makes cleaning easier.

If a barrel is too perfectly slick, the carbon will not stick but the jacket material can and will build up on itself. If the barrel has minor imperfections, jacket material will stick. If left alone, this material will build upon itself to a certain extent making little speed bumps down the barrel. On such minor imperfections, if you remove this copper fouling keeping it in check (WITHOUT DAMAGING THE RIFLING OR CROWN) some imperfections will smooth out and burnish w/ carbon fouling and in essence "break-in". This will help maximize the potential of the barrel you have.

Someone using poor and/or aggressive techniques can easily trash a perfectly serviceable match grade barrel by taking the edge off the rifling and/or screwing up the crown. Someone using proper techniques that is not aggressive can maximize the accuracy of certain barrels w/out increasing barrel wear.

With todays foaming bore cleaners that easily removes copper fouling, I see no reason that the average shooter needs to use abrasive or harsh substances in the barrel of a hunting rifle. Some competition shooters may need to use more aggressive techniques do to time constraints during a match but that should not apply to the average joe.

GVA

To break in, or not to break in, that is the question, wheather it is far, far better to fire on and clean one, than to fire all at once and then clean.

Apply an iota of logic. The only way to not break a barrel in, is to not shoot it. So, the only question is how to break it in. I do the one shot one clean routine simply because I can. It's convinient. My range is out of my back door. I do it becasue one shot and clean tells me a lot about the condition of the bore and its potential. I do it because I have to get the scope on paper. I di it becasue it gives me a reading on how the rifle will group out of a cold barrel.

Does it make a difference? Don't know, but I doubt that it is as bad as some shooters inist it is.

We in the shooting shpts have a habit of looking for and wanting absolutes. No such animal exists. We're all different, and our rifles are all different. That's what we can't get through our heads.

Check out this link I found in another forum. It is a post by Gale McMillan.Barrel Break-in

I´ve never broken in a barrel and I never will. All my rifles shoot better than I do...

There may be something to a proper breakin procedure BUT the sweetest shooting rifle that I have ever owned shoots like a dream today and never a formal anything as far as a planned breakin procedure.
Some things are just splitting hairs but somebody here may believe in it strongly but not me.

Here is another letter from Gale McMillian on the uselessness of barrel break ins:

From: Gale McMillan <" gale"@mcmfamily.com>
Newsgroups: rec.guns
Subject: Re: Barrel break-in necessary?
Date: 7 Jan 1997 20:40:25 -0500

Mike Sumner wrote:
> ...

As a barrel maker I have looked in thousands of new and used barrels
with a bore scope and I will tell you that if everyone followed the
prescribed break in method A very large number would do more harm than help. The reason you hear of the help in accuracy is because if you
chamber barrel with a reamer that has a dull throater instead of cutting
clean sharp rifling it smears a burr up on the down wind side of the
rifling. It takes from 1 to 2 hundred rounds to burn this bur out and
the rifle to settle down and shoot its best. Any one who chambers rifle
barrels has tolerances on how dull to let the reamer get and factories
let them go longer than any competent smith would. Another tidbit to
consider, take a 300Win Mag. that has a life expectancy of 1000 rounds.
Use 10% of it up with your break in procedure for every 10 barrels the
barrel maker makes he has to make one more just to take care of the
break in. No wonder barrel makers like to see this. Now when you flame
me on this please include what you think is happening to the inside of
your barrel during the break in that is helping you.

Gale McMillan
NBSRA IBS,FCSA and NRA Life Member



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

From: Gale McMillan <mcmillan@getnet.com>
Newsgroups: rec.guns
Subject: Re: Good barrels for Rem 700 in .308?
Date: 10 Feb 1996 12:50:53 -0500

Consider this, every round shot in breaking in a barrel is one round off
the life of said rifle barrel. No one has ever told me the physical
reason of what happens during break in firing. In other words to the
number of pounds of powder shot at any given pressure, is the life of the
barrel. No one has ever explained what is being accomplished by
shooting and cleaning in any prescribed method. Start your barrel off
with 5 rounds and clean it thoroughly and do it again. Nev Maden a
friend down under that my brother taught to make barrels was the one who came up with the break in method. He may think he has come upon
something, or he has come up with another way to sell barrels. I feel
that the first shot out of a barrel is its best and every one after that
deteriorates until the barrel is gone. If someone can explain what
physically takes place during break in to modify the barrel then I may
change my mind. As the physical properties of a barrel doesn't change
because of the break in procedures it means it's all hog wash. I am open
to any suggestions that can be documented otherwise if it is just
someone's opinion forget it.

Gale McMillan

That very, very old Gale McMillan post from an unrelated thread may be slightly out of context today.

I tend to agree and lean towards the writings of Dan Lilja reference barrel fouling:

http://www.riflebarrels.com/articles/barrel_making/barrel_fouling.htm

GVA

It was 9 years ago. Whats changed?? Bill T.

Most are pretty much saying the same thing but are looking at it from different angles. Gale preached over and over about the THEN common practice of using an abrasive compound on a patch w/ a jag and cleaning rod in a regimented break-in process. He never preached to leave copper fouling in the bore and to allow it to build up.

What has changed today is the availability of newer non-caustic and non-abrasive cleaning solvents that will easily remove copper fouling w/out damaging the rifling or crown.

If your rifle fouls badly after one or two rounds and you ignore this and just allow it to build, your barrel life will not change but you will not see the maximum accuracy potential of that barrel. If then you resort to extremely aggressive techniques to remove this excessive copper build up, your barrel life will probably be shortened and you may still never see the maximum accuracy potential of that barrel.

If on the other hand you use proper/non-aggressive techniques to remove this initial copper fouling early (before it has a chance to excessively build up), your barrel will begin to burnish along the rifling and grooves with a hard carbon deposit. Your barrel life will not change but the copper will have less ability to stick to the bore. Some barrels reach the point that they can go hundreds of rounds w/out a trace of copper, others may go from fouling badly in one shot to only slightly fouling in 3-5 shots. Some barrels are just plain bad. In this scenerio, you are not doing anything that improves upon what the barrel maker did but you are maximizing the potential accuracy of what you have w/out decreasing barrel life.

Now in the Gale Mcmillan scenerio you take a 1000yd benchrest barrel using what was a fad technique in the 90s to polish the bore using aggressive compounds and rifle cleaning equipment in a very strict regimented "break-in" process. This was often thought to improve upon what the barrel maker did but in reality neither broke in a barrel nor reduce copper fouling. As Gale often preached, this method would most likely destroy a barrel in short order.

This is a good post on the subject by Gale:

Gale McMillan
Senior Member posted September 27, 1999 09:48 PM

"Look at it this way, A barrel starts out with nice sharp areas of the corners of the rifling . Along the way you build a big fire in it a few thousand times and it burns the corners off. Now take a barrel that to break in you put an abrasive on a patch and run it in and out. The result is that you take the corners off the rifling so that all that fire which would have started with sharp rifling is now starting with rifling that is thousands of rounds old. Which means that a lot of the life is gone. A lap always cuts more on each end where the compound reverses direction as it starts back through the barrel which means that it is enlarging the bore at each ends of the barrel. And last picture a patch riding along the barrel with abrasive on it. It is removing material at a given rate. It comes to a place where there is copper fouling and it rides over it cutting the same amount that it was cutting before it came to the copper. You continue until all the fouling is gone and what have you done? You have put the came contour in the barrel steel that was in it when it was metal fouled. It would not be as bad if it were used on a lead lap but I ask why would you want to abuse the barrel when you can accomplish the same thing without the bad side effects. There is Sweats, Otters foul out or just a good daily cleaning with a good bore cleaner till the fouling is gone. To top this off I will relate a true happening. I built a bench rest rifle for a customer and as usual I fired 5 groups of 5 shots and calculated the aggregate. It was good enough to see that the rifle was capable of winning the Nationals so I shipped it. I got a call from the new owner saying how happy he was with it the way it shot. About 4 weeks later the rifle showed up with a note saying it wouldn't shoot. Sure enough when I tested it it was shooting groups three times the size if the ones I had shot before I shipped it. When I bore scoped it the barrel looked like a mirror and the rifling wasn't square it was half round. From that time on I put a flyer in each gun saying if any abrasive was use in it voided the Warrantee. Now I am not trying to stop you from doing what you want but just inform you what is happening when you use JB. Brass brushes are softer than barrel steel and does no harm. S/S brushes are harder than barrel steel is definetly a no no. Nylon may surprise you to know is very abrasive If you doubt this look at the carbide eye on yout fishing rod where nylon line has worn groves into it."
- Gale McMillan


good luck,
GVA

quote:

What has changed today is the availability of newer non-caustic and non-abrasive cleaning solvents that will easily remove copper fouling w/out damaging the rifling or crown.

Ammonia (Sweets) has been around longer than benchrest shooters. Bill T.

Ammonia is highly aggressive. That was Gale recommending the Sweets over abrasives back in 1999. I used it back then but not anymore. Even though Sweets sticks to the bore better than a straight ammonia solvent, it still requires working a jaged patch.

I'm refering to the new breed of brushless cleaners such as Wipe-Out and a few of the other foaming cleaners that contain neither acid nor ammonia. These remove fouling w/out having to work any brush or patch thru the barrel. I'll apply the foam cleaner and let it sit. I'll push or pull a dry patch followed by a patch that is slightly damp w/ shooters choice (it is mild and evaporates w/out residue) then a lightly oiled patch. This removes any fouling w/out adding to any barrel wear that Gale was referring to.

GVA

T be hinest I reckon it's a load of shit..................I have done it for a couple of varmint guns, I like to keep my barrels clean of copper etc. but at the same token I reckon your best of keeping the cleaning rods out of your good barrels as much as you can.

I clean a new barrel/Gun test some loads etc. give it a clean, sight it in give it a clean, but shoot 1 clean, shoot 2 clean etc. waste of my time.......................but it works for some. I beleive that a barrel from shot one begins the wearing process however minute, so a barrel IMHO shoots it's best when it's new...........................but hey what would I know, it's just my opinion and might be to justify my laziness in not doing a proper run in's

Who wrote the rule that a little copper fouling is so bad?? Bill T.

I will add my limmited knowledge.
The subject of "barrel Break In" came up a few years ago on another website I was at. It received alot of posts. One in particular was worth mentioning. I do not recall who posted it, but it was suposidly a exact copy of the famous barrel maker ( I know Im spelling his name wrong, sorry) Gene Schillens offical statement and stance on so called barrel break in.
I can not remember to be able to quote it verbatim, but Mr Schillen stated that barrel break in was a total false hood started by another smaller barrel maker to hasten barrel where and he went on to say to do any barrel break in proceadures to one of his barrels would void all warrenties on his barrels.

I still do a break in of my barrels, because it has never hurt me in the past.

Some here state Gale McMillan is against barrel break-in.
Reading the post by GaryVA above it seems to me he advocates it.
He apparently just doesn't want clowns trying to lap the rifleing out his nice new barrels.

I've never heard of anyone confusing lapping with a "start-up" cleaning regime before.

And you'd have to be a bit of a character to think you could "improve" an expensive barrel from a top barrel maker.