yes jerkface, your logic is unassailable. krieger is just a used car salesman lying to us all because he wants a 10 month backlog instead of a 6 month backlog of orders.
Krieger says "So when we break in a barrel, our goal is to get the throat polished without allowing copper to build up in the bore."
But where is the logic in this? If the goal is to polish the throat, why do we clean the bore? The bore has nothing to do with the throat. The goal isn't to polish the bore, that is what the hand lapping has done. So what do we accomplish? 10 rounds through cleaning between each, we have a polished throat and a clean bore. On the other hand, if we don't clean between each round and only after round 10 we would have a polished throat and a clean bore. If we didn't clean at all we would have a polished throat and a bore that has 10 rounds worth of buildup. So what are we accomplishing?
Now, if you say the copper deposits in the throat and must be clean out, why? Isn't the plasma that is polishing this area violent enough to remove any past issues? Let's say that you only see polishing effects with a perfectly clean bore. Now, you shoot 30 rounds without cleaning, go home, clean the bore well, and it counts as 1 round. Maybe you fouled up a little sooner than if you had done the break in? After a few round of this though, you are right to where you would be had you followed the break in.
Now lets look at Lilja.
"It is important to break-in a barrel though. The jacket material must be removed after every shot during the initial few rounds. If this isn't done the areas of the barrel that fouled will tend to pick up more fouling and it will build on itself. It is important to get a layer of powder fouling on top of the lands & grooves. This hard deposit will prevent the copper from stripping off the bullets. However, if the internal finish of the barrel is too rough the barrel will never be completely broken-in and fouling will always be a problem. Some barrels can't be broken-in."
But wait. How do we get a layer of powder fouling before we get a layer of copper fouling? The bullet comes first. If the bore is going to pick up fouling it would first be copper. And lets say we clean the barrel. Now what? We have no fouling of any kind and are back to the conditions of shot 1. Do you need to start the break in over? And why isn't this the same story that Krieger gave? They said the goal was to polish the throat. Lilja says it's to deposit a layer of powder fouling first. Hard to believe these two sources disagree on what the break in is doing.
Then look at Bartlein. Their scientific explanation as to why you break in? None. They even say a lot of rifles with a proper break in will foul more than others and still shoot as good as they are going to. But doesn't that sound like break in is no different than regular use? If break in was such an exact science that had merit why would this happen?
I obviously don't believe in break in. I would love to see someone take a decent sample of barrels from a given manufacturer, break in half and just shoot the other half, and document their results. I unfortunately, don't have the time nor resources to do so. I will also say, that while I don't believe in break in, I typically follow it in the off case it were to be effective. I use those first shots to get on paper anyways so it takes nothing away from what I would get out of the rifle had I not done so. Seems silly but I do it none the less.
There is a real lack of any hard evidence showing that break in does much of anything that regular use wouldn't also accomplish. The manufacturers who promote break in, right or wrong, use little science if any to back their claims. They state general concepts as truth, correct or not. Their word of perform break in is no more or less important than McMillin's word to not break in. When someone has more than a theory of why it does or doesn't work we can move on. Until then, it's all just theory on both sides of the coin.
