Starting off with breaking in a new Rifle barrel, you can google how to do this and find 10,000 different answers and mine comes from someone with over five thousand rounds through each of his 16 rifles, so I find this a trust worthy source in collaboration with what I have learned on my own.
So the one thing that I am realizing as I get into shooting is that finding your own truth’s in the name of learning, sometimes is the only way to go. We can all listen to opinions of people that do it (Whatever “it” may be) for a living, but do they really know what they are talking about because they are old? I am young, 26 to be exact and I have learned a lot in my short life. Nothing says that anything I have learned is correct, it will only be as correct as the person that taught me, knowing something wrong at 60 just means you have been wrong allot longer than I have!
First of all there are a lot of different opinions on how to break in a rifle if you have one that works for you I couldn’t be happier, this one works for me. You will need two things to properly break in a barrel on your rifle. One is a good carbon cleaner which every company produces. The other cleaning product you will need is a copper solvent also produced by most companies like sweet’s(Research your copper solvent, there is a little more to them than carbon cleaner).
The pattern is 5 in this section. In each section when I say clean I mean both carbon cleaner as well as copper solvent. I will list the Pattern as it could be confusing if in paragraph format…
- Repeat this section five times
- Take one shot
- Clean
- Change the target out, number it (Recommended, not needed)
- Repeat this section five times
- Take two shots
- Clean
- Change the target out, number it (Recommended, not needed)
- Repeat this section five times
- Take five shots
- Clean
- Change the target out, number it (Recommended, not needed)
What you are looking for is a difference in consistency as this process progresses. If you start to notice less and less drifting in your shots (Drifting – Difference between 1st and second/third/fourth/fifth shot) then you can stop as you have accomplished your goal. This is why I recommend changing the target, you can tell on the progress of the break in process as you see the difference in consistency change progressively if you are diligent in changing and numbering them.
The last thing to remember is that most people tell you clean your gun before you shoot. Your gun will be least accurate with a clean bore, so if you go to the range and put 20 rounds through it, don’t worry about cleaning it. If you are going to a competition tomorrow and you just cleaned your rifle, get to the range and put 10 rounds or so down range before heading to your competition. That in mind I personally don’t strip copper out of my barrel as it will not damage it, my rifle is a 1/2 MOA rifle, it was 3/4 MOA after about 1000 rounds (The predicted lifespan of my barrel) I stripped the copper out of it for the first time and about 30 rounds later it was back to a 1/2 MOA gun. This is why I trust my own experience, I have proved everything I have read wrong, and I am still 1/2 MOA, so I refer back to my favorite saying that you can not hone your shooting skills by running your mouth in a gun store. Take care and be safe!