35 Whelen Break in

[shell70634]

I just bought a Ruger #1 in 35 Whelen that I plan on using mostly cast boolits in. Would there be any benefit in shooting a hundred or so jacketed through it to smooth out the bore first? Would that help to reduce leading later?

[MOA]

Nooooooooooooo, if you're going to be shooting cast than keep as much copper out of the bore as you can.

[oldblinddog]

I shoot cast to breakin my rifles that will be shooting jacketed bullets...

[Earlwb]

No break in needed. About the only break in my guns get, if you call it that, is being shot at the range to get it sighted in. Then it is off to be used for hunting etc. The consensus is to shoot cast bullets in the rifle and skip the jacketed bullets. the slight amount of copper, etc. residue left in the barrel with jacketed bullets could lead to leading. But I can't say if that is really true at this time though. I have shot both jacketed and lead bullets out of some of my rifles and I didn't notice anything. But I wasn't looking for it either.

[shell70634]

Decided to dedicate to lead only. coww 225 gr plain base, 22 gr IMR 4227, 1575 fps. Not trusting my old chrony so will try on friends. inch and a half at 40 yds

[EDG]

No one here can tell you about the finish of your barrel.

However you can let your barrel tell you. Shoot a few rounds and clean by wiping with a patch moist with a little Hoppes.

Look for jacket fouling in the bore. If you find none shoot a little more. If you make it to 20 rounds with no copper jacket fouling your bore probably does not need much break in. If you have jacket fouling you will need to do the shoot and clean exercise until the copper jacket fouling quits. Then do a copper removal cleaning if you are going to shoot cast bullets. To totally remove all copper fouling let it set over night with a film of Hoppes in the bore. Wipe out the next day and apply another film of Hoppes. Do this for 10 days to a month if necessary to get all of the fouling out.

All the jacketed bullets do is iron down the rough spots and tight spots in the bore that cause metal fouling. Every barrel is different. Only you can tell what your barrel needs.

The very high quality barrels that have been lapped such as the Badger BPCR match barrels or 40X Remington barrels are so smooth from the factory they would not benefit from any break in. Many Mauser miltary barrels that have not been fired have all linear marks that do not foul. A lot of fast and nasty production button rifled barrels have reamer marks that really need to be smoothed out. Take a good look into a 1960s or 1970s Savage 340 barrel or a 30-30 Marlin Microgroove barrel. You will see lots of reamer marks in those and probably a lot of initial fouling too.

During the last 5 decades I shot a number of new rifles that were fairly accurate to begin with. I cleaned them after every 5 round group and after every hunting trip. They never were shot more than 5 times without being wiped out with a moist Hoppes patch. These barrels improved in accuracy at between 100 and 200 rounds. That was about the number of rounds the bluing in the bores started to disappear. This break in did not cause any extra wear in my rifles because I did not shoot my rifle any extra rounds called break in rounds. The only ammo I shot was to develop loads at the range, to zero the scopes or while hunting. I did clean my rifle after each 5 round group. In some cases I cleaned the rifles more often as in after 3 round groups. All I did was spend a little extra effort cleaning my bores during trips to the range. My bores seemed to foul less and shoot better. It cost me nothing but a little time.

[lefty o]

conversely once could use a better solvent than hoppes and not take a month to get copper out of a barrel. butchs bore shine, shooters choice, and several others are mucho better. if you really feel the rush, there is always sweets.

[Earlwb]

I was thinking that one needs to use Butch's Bore shine outside with a good breeze. Whatever that stuff is, you definitely don't want to inhale any of it. But it is probably pretty good stuff if you can avoid the fumes.
Sweets though seems to work pretty well and it doesn't have much in the way of fumes or odor to it.

[lefty o]

I was thinking that one needs to use Butch's Bore shine outside with a good breeze. Whatever that stuff is, you definitely don't want to inhale any of it. But it is probably pretty good stuff if you can avoid the fumes.
Sweets though seems to work pretty well and it doesn't have much in the way of fumes or odor to it.

i find them just the opposite. sweets is nasty and will curl the hairs in your nose.

[atr]

I shoot 250gr Cast but also jacketed...never had a leading problem even though I don't always clean the bore after shooting J's.

and I have never had an accuracy issue....the cast still print within 2" sq at 100 yds when I shoot from kneeling with sticks

[shell70634]

atr,
which 250 cast do you use? the heaviest 35 I have is 228 grain and I'm contemplating a 250 to 290 grain mold.