A little different break-in than I have seen before...

[Jeff A]

What am I missing here?? How can you judge the accuracy of a barrel without having done a complete load work up? What makes you think this load should shoot better??

You may be missing something, not sure. I think that a barrel that shoots a group in the 2's and 3's is accurate. I can judge it by looking at the targets.

"What makes you think this load should shoot better?" I doubt very much it will shoot better. Not with my 73 year old eyes!

 

[rifleman700]

But without a dedicated load work up you will never know if it shoots better. I don't understand how a random load can be used to determine accuracy.

 

[Jeff A]

But without a dedicated load work up you will never know if it shoots better. I don't understand how a random load can be used to determine accuracy.

I am/was starting the "load workup" process. When I fire this load again, and if it shoots in the high 2's or something like that, why would I continue? How many $$ and how much barrel wear should I spend to get a better load than the one I found easily? I never used a random load to determine accuracy. I did use a random load initially to do some break in. I personally had never seen a quality aftermarket barrel shoot anything as bad as this one started out, so my original question was if anyone had experienced a good barrel shoot that badly.

 

[rifleman700]

I guess I did not understand your premise behind this all but I think I understand it now. I never shoot break in rounds for group because of the process I use, so for me break in loads only have that one purpose.

FWIW I did a barrel break in of 3 different barrels last year at the same time and what I thought I would see actually was totally different. I did a 7MM RUM with a Krieger, a 7MM SAUM with a Bartlein and a 6.5CM with a Shilen and I expected the RUM barrel to break in quicker due to the bullets extra bearing surface with a 190 grain bullet but the Shilen was actually completely broke in at the 10 round mark. The SAUM ( 168 grain bullet ) was next at around 15 and the RUM at 20 rounds fired. The Shilen is still far easier to clean than the other two but I am not sure that is a fair comparison being that the Shilen is BR select match, the Bartlein is CR5R and the Krieger is CR. All of my cut rifle barrels have seemed to take an extra bit of time to speed up and smooth out compared to button rifled barrels.