At the risk of being stringhaulter and gilflurted I suggest that you just shoot them until they are broke in, you can clean them from time to time if you like or if the groups open up...
I tried all the secret methods of barrel break-in and finally came to the conclusion that a good barrel shoots and a bad barrel does not and all else is hooey!!
I clean my rifles after each shoot with about half a doze passes with a bore snake and am done with it, then once a year, after hunting seasons is over, I clean them with Wipe Out and grease the bores.
I ALWAYS clean the bore on a new rifle very throughly before I ever shoot it to get the remaining metal parts out of it from chambering or whatever, just in case the smith didn't...After that the bore is pretty much on its own...:) If it does not shoot to my satisfaction it comes off and a new one goes on, but that has not happened since I went to Lothar Walthar barrels, they ALL shoot tiny groups...
BTW, I have notice no difference since I quit breaking them in...
I better add that I am not a benchrest shooter these days, but I do want a rifle to shoot an inch for 3 shots at 100 yards at least, and am really a happy camper if it will shoot a 5 shot one inch group but most will not do that, they tend to open up on 4 and 5 it seems, but fortunatly not much.
Last edited by atkinson; 05/11/09.
