barrel break in pictoral log

[lbs]

more than likely you'll experience will vary with every barrel you break in.
read this by one of the best makers and his advise.

http://bartleinbarrels.com/BreakInCleaning.htm

 

[MCMXI]

taliv, for the past few years I've been using Sharp Shoot R Wipe-Out foaming bore cleaner so decided to change my barrel break in regime slightly since I let the foam sit for an hour or so. The question was asked whether or not a barrel that has seen a bunch of rounds could still be "broken in". My answer is yes, if broken in means that the throat has been polished to the extent that no rough spots exist that can help to foul the rest of the barrel (via plasma). I decided to shoot five rounds and then clean with Wipe-Out. Then shoot another five rounds and clean again, doing this until I get no more copper from the barrel. The first five-round group using the Hornady 120gr GMX factory load did produce some copper after the foam sat in the barrel for about an hour. It didn't shoot that well and I was a little concerned at this poin.

First patch, 1st group


First patch, 1st group showing copper on patch and on towel (foam drips from barrel)


Second patch, 1st group


Third patch, 1st group


Target showing 5-round group, #1 through #5 (Hornady 120gr GMX)

 

[MCMXI]

For the second five-round group I decided to use the Hornady 140gr A-MAX load that has performed well in a number of rifles that I've shot. I let the Wipe-Out sit for an hour and a half and there was very little copper on the first patch and none on the paper towel where the foam dripped out. As the target shows below, this barrel looks to be a shooter.

First patch, 2nd group


Second patch, 2nd group


Third patch, 2nd group


Target showing 5-shot group, rounds #6 through #10 (Hornady 140gr A-MAX)

 

[MCMXI]

I'll shoot one more 5-round group and clean with Wipe-Out and post the results. I'll shoot the Hornady 140gr A-MAX load again since it seems to perform well in the Bartlein barrel. If there's no copper I won't clean the barrel until I'm ready to start load development which won't be until the suppressors arrive. I'll post any significant results at that time. I have 120 or so of the 140gr A-MAX load so I plan to run through them so that I can use the brass. That should give me a good idea as to how well the throat has been polished. Also, I'll shoot all future groups with a Dead Air KEYMOUNT brake installed since that's what I'll be using with the SANDMAN-L and SANDMAN-S that will be arriving any day now.

 

[taliv]

thanks for posting! I'm not clear though. Are you saying those are the first 10 rounds on a new barrel? or are you showing that a barrel with a bunch of rounds already on it can clean up and stop copper fouling?

 

[MCMXI]

taliv, sorry for the confusion... it's a new barrel. But whether you shoot one round, five rounds or fifty rounds between cleaning, you can still polish the throat if you remove all of the copper to reveal the high spots. So for someone who has shot hundreds of rounds through a new barrel without cleaning, if they remove all of the copper they are at the second round of your process.

 

[Elkins45]

Tangentially related question: what was the average round count before you needed to replace a barrel?

 

[HOOfan_1]

For me, as a casual shooter, any of these procedures would waste valuable range time. At one time, I got to the range probably once a month, now I am lucky to get there once a year. If I could go once a week and spend a few hours there, I might try a break in.

At the same time, why can't the break in procedure span a few years?

For my Groundhog gun when I was working up loads, I probably shot about 40 rounds per a range session, took it home and used wipe-out to remove all the copper. I probably made 5 range trips to work up the load I am using...so assume

Shoot 40 rounds-clean and remove copper fouling
Shoot 40 rounds-clean and remove copper fouling
Shoot 40 rounds-clean and remove copper fouling
Shoot 40 rounds-clean and remove copper fouling
Shoot 40 rounds-clean and remove copper fouling

after that, I am shooting it 10 or so times a year and then cleaning it after groundhog season ends...it's been 5 years now.

 

[waterhouse]

Thanks for the write up and pictures. I have used a similar method on a factory 700 police model . . . I think it was 5 or 6 shots before it wasn't showing any blue on the patch.

For me, as a casual shooter, any of these procedures would waste valuable range time.

They don't need to waste a lot of time, at least if you have multiple projects. You can run a patch through pretty quickly and shoot another gun while you wait for the copper solvent to work. While I make it to the range often for work, the time per range trip is usually limited; careful planning can allow for a lot to be done in limited time.

 

[another pake]

Thanks taliv and MCMXI. The pictorial explanation makes things easier for my aging brain to grasp than words alone.

 

[MCMXI]

At the same time, why can't the break in procedure span a few years?

I think it can, particularly if you don't clean the barrel after a shooting session. It might even take a lifetime of shooting and some barrels may never "break in" if you take that to mean that they still foul with copper after 10, 20, 30 ..... 100 rounds. Some barrels are so poorly made that copper will always collect somewhere in the barrel. Some people have barrels that only shoot good once they're fouled with copper. I would hate to have one of those barrels. I want a barrel that shoots to the same POA cold/clean/hot/fouled. The top group shown below was shot yesterday from my new 6.5 Creedmoor Bartlein barrel after cleaning with foaming bore cleaner a few days earlier. The one shot out of the group was #4 (#14 overall) which I put down to mirage off the barrel since it was 30F in my shooting room. The second group (on the right) was shot with a Dead Air brake installed only hand tight and mirage was definitely an issue with that group. I did make a scope adjustment before shooting the second group. The main point is that there's no cold/clean bore offset with this barrel. This is the same for all of my quality barrels and was certainly true for my Krieger barreled rifles that I sold.

 

[Gtscotty]

honestly, i don't know. If I had a factory precision rifle barrel, like a savage or ruger precision rifle, i would do this break in on it, and if it was still copper fouling after 10 tries or so, i would give up and just shoot it. no way i have the patience or attention span to do a 100 round break in.

if you have the opportunity, please try it and post your results. i'd like to know as well

I was wondering while reading this thread if you had tried this kind of break-in on a factory barrel. I have an RPR 6.5CM on the way, I may give your method a go to see how it works on a factory rig. I'm surprised you didn't use a more aggressive copper solvent. Shooter's choice does well with fouling, but i always had better luck getting copper out with something like Boretech Eliminator.

 

[MCMXI]

taliv, here's my final post on barrel break in. I shot 10 rounds yesterday which are rounds #11 to #20 through the barrel. I've already shown the results cleaning after rounds #6 to #10 and didn't clean after 15 rounds through the barrel. The barrel is very close to being broken in with just a hint of copper after shooting 10 rounds. However, this barrel might take four or five cleanings in all before it shows no sign of fouling. In other words, had I followed the 'shoot one round and clean process' you describe it'd probably take 4 or 5 rounds before I could claim that the throat is nicely polished. Accuracy is good for a rifle shot off a bipod and with less mirage I'd expect groups to be even better (see target for groups #3 and #4 above).


First patch, after third and fourth groups (10 rounds)


First patch, after third and fourth groups, copper on patch


Second patch, after third and fourth groups


Third patch, after third and fourth groups

 

[taliv]

elkins, between 1500 and 2400, depending on how fast i pushed it

hoofan, by contrast, i cleaned 3 times, and i won't clean the barrel again until i have over 1000 rounds through it. (unless something unusual happens) i already put 187 rounds on that barrel and cleaned it at 170 rounds... no copper came out. you clean every 40 and get copper. like 1911 said, that may work for you, but my barrels don't seem to like it.
not sure how to take your question. the break in i described took 3 rounds. are you really asking if you can stretch that over a few years? i'm sure you could, but i'm not sure what the point would be.

I'm surprised you didn't use a more aggressive copper solvent. Shooter's choice does well with fouling, but i always had better luck getting copper out with something like Boretech Eliminator.

i have to admit to an error. I forgot I ran out of shooters choice a couple months ago, and stopped by a local store and all they had was butch's bore shine, so i've been using that. The photos in the OP were NOT shooters choice. also, i should mention, when i used shooters choice, it was mostly 2/3 shooters choice, 1/3 kroil, fwiw. however, my experience with shooters choice has been identical. I think getting copper out in the first and second round is way, way easier than after you've mashed it in and put a lot more copper in the bore. i really couldn't say why it seems to hard to get out later on.

1911, thanks for all the pics! (as a side note, you can use the resize tag to reduce the size of them)

all, I got my new 6.5x47 Lapua half sorted out today and put the first 5 rounds through it. cleaned it twice. didn't seem to be a need for it after that, plus i was out of daylight. I assume people are tired of looking at pictures of dirty patches, but i did take pics and would be happy to post them if anyone wants to see them.

 

[HOOfan_1]

elkins, between 1500 and 2400, depending on how fast i pushed it

hoofan, by contrast, i cleaned 3 times, and i won't clean the barrel again until i have over 1000 rounds through it. (unless something unusual happens) i already put 187 rounds on that barrel and cleaned it at 170 rounds... no copper came out. you clean every 40 and get copper. like 1911 said, that may work for you, but my barrels don't seem to like it.
not sure how to take your question. the break in i described took 3 rounds. are you really asking if you can stretch that over a few years? i'm sure you could, but i'm not sure what the point would be
.

The point is that I rarely get to the range and I don't have time to clean my gun 5 or 6 times at the range especially waiting 30 minutes to let the copper solvent do its work. Actually after having cleaned my gun with wipe-out about 10 times, I am not getting noticeable copper fouling anymore.

It does the job for me, I can still hit a groundhog in the head at 200 yards.

I don't mind cleaning my guns when I get home, but since I rarely get to the range, I want to be shooting while there and not cleaning.

 

[taliv]

just another anecdote on the low SDs I mentioned above, suggesting they come partially from not having copper in the bore... this is pretty much why i spend the time to clean after the first couple of rounds:

here's 3 groups, 3 different powder charges, while working up a load in the snow early this morning with this new rifle (not the same one in the OP, but a new 6.5x47L i just got and did same break in to, with just 2 rounds, 8 patches)

There are 149 total rounds on the barrel, and it's been 147 since the last time I cleaned it. These are all the shots fired today (no warm up or anything). All 3 groups are single digit extreme spreads



(i'm just checking for pressure to see how much velocity I can get, so not loading a lot of rounds per group)

first group, 36.11g varget, 4 rounds
2686
2679
2678
2680
ES 8

second group, 37.00g varget, 3 rounds
2729
2736
2732
ES 7

third group, 37.36g varget, 3 rounds
2760
2760
2756
ES 4
(note in the pic i forgot to start a new group, so it still has 3 rounds from the second group in the average and SD)
[resize=350] [/resize]

 

[MCMXI]

taliv, those are some really nice ES numbers. I handload for my gf's 6.5x47 Lapua and also use Varget. She shoots 130gr Berger VLD Match bullets with 38.0gr of Varget and BR4 primers. Average velocity is 2,800 fps and ES numbers are typically in the 8 fps range. Out of interest why did you opt for 6.5x47 Lapua?

 

[taliv]

Just an interesting update. I decided on 37.36g for my match load finally, and loaded 5 more. I've shot a bit more and am up to 182 rounds now. What's interesting is my barrel is still speeding up. In my previous post I had an avg of just under 2760 with ES of 4.
Today i shot
2779
2779
2783
2782
2779
So still an ES of 4 fps but Ive gained 20 fps. It's still shooting a bit slower than I want so I don't mind but in my experience they have usually plateaued by 150 rounds.

I'm pretty happy that 180 rounds after cleaning it, the fouling is consistent enough to keep a 1 SD but I hope the velocity settles soon (or that we have really tall targets in the match next weekend.)

1911, my gunsmith likes it. I thought it would make a good round for mid range matches with more barricades and such. Less recoil. Reputation for great brass that's in stock. No complaints so far.

 

[Frostbite]

Do you unscrew the jag from the rod before you pull it back?

 

[taliv]

no, but i lift it up so it doesn't drag on the bottom of the crown

 

[taliv]

update...

rounds 390-400 are still shooting a 3 FPS SD and 11 FPS ES. (and a nice tight group too)
That's 388 rounds since it was cleaned.

 

[MCMXI]

taliv, has your ES improved with your current chrony? Just wondering if measuring close to the muzzle and not using contrast to determine velocity results in lower ES values.

 

[taliv]

no, the CED that i was using years ago measured just fine when it worked. it's just the lighting conditions and trying to shoot over the right spot (and maybe me occasionally adding a few extra holes in the sensor) made it highly unreliable and i would only ever get readings maybe 60-70% of the time. but when it gave a reading, it was accurate to my knowledge. i used to get 1 SDs with it too.

in a couple of years of shooting with the magnetospeed, the ONLY round i didn't get a reading on was one where i blew the end cap off of my suppressor.

 

[MCMXI]

OK.... I have the IR kit on my CED and use it 100% of the time regardless of the conditions. I haven't had a single error since buying the IR kit and that's shooting hundreds of rounds over it in all kinds of weather conditions. The reason I ask is that I don't typically get such low ES values and was wondering if it was due to the measuring system. Thanks for the clarification.

 

[taliv]

brief update on my barrel test...

at 515 rounds, i decided to clean the chamber, because rounds weren't going in or coming out as smooth and i thought i was getting some carbon and other misc junk building up in the chamber. so i tried to do this without touching the bore, but didn't do such a good job of that. I used a nylon brush with some slip2k carbon killer on it and just stuck it in there til it stopped and twisted it around. i later measured and realized i'd stuck it an inch or two into the bore. then i used a bunch of swabs like shotgun mops to try to clean out the chamber, but they didn't go into the bore where i'd stuck the solvent. oh well.

so I went out today and shot 2 rounds at a target, then threw the chrono on and shot a 10 rounds group at 540 yards. target is a 12" steel plate.
pretty sure i got some solvent affecting the bore because the velocities I got started out low for several rounds, then went back where i expected them.
velocities were
2770
2777
2774
2774
2763
2774
2783
2783
2782
2777
if you just took the whole 10 rounds as a group, that would still be an SD 6 and ES of 20.
if you looked at it as one group with a slightly molested bore by an idiot that doesn't know how far to stick the brush in, that eventually fouls back in and goes back to normal, it looks a LOT tighter. the last groups i chrono'd at 182 rounds and 400 rounds averaged 2780 and 2782 fps, so the last 4 shots look like they're right there. guess it took 6+2 rounds to get there after cleaning the chamber.
but at the same time, i suppose if i wanted to clean every 10 rounds or so, i'd still get great SDs, they'd just be 10-20 fps slower.


good news is it's still shooting decent groups. hard to measure 10 round groups on steel by how the 80 layers of paint randomly flake off, but it looks to me like 2.5" x 2.5" and definitely no more than 3.5" by 3.5" edge to edge.