What aspect of a barrel's bore is the most important overall? Is it the overall surface quality or the quality of the rifling?
I don't get out to go shoot as much as I would like, so most of my guns have bright shiney bores. Several of them though are older guns I bought, and some I have built from kits.
Today I was looking over a FAL that I built several years ago, and I noticed pitting in the last quarter of the bore. The rifling is fine, but there is just random pitting due to it being a kit gun and having an older barrel. Should I replace it?
What affect does slight pitting have on a bbl if the rifling is still healthy so to speak? What do you all consider a good bbl? Is it one that is shiney as a mirror, or just one that has strong rifling? Or is it the throat of the bbl?
I am not talking about sub MOA quality here, just general health of a bbl in a military semi-auto rifle.