<blockquote>"Did Laurance or Joel discuss having it polished out by a gunsmith, or is there another way to correct the problem? I just think this should not happen on a quality gun that is properly maintained."</blockquote>
Laurance said that, yes, he could polish the bore and probably remove most of the etching but he would have to take the barrel back to his shop in Virginia to do it and then ship it to me when he was done. He indicated, however, that he could not guarantee that the same thing would not happen again. I intend to have him clean my action at this year's State shoot so I'm have him look at it again.
I had John Allem look at the bore as well. His son measured the bore from end to end with a bore guage and it showed the bore to be absolutely dead-straight with NO movement in the gauge needle at all as it passed through the area. He also indicated that the area could be removed by honing but cautioned me that the Citoris are already over-bored to .740" and that he considered .745" to be the absolute maximum for a 12 gage bore. His point was that honing and polishing would probably bring the bore diameter very close to that.
I have, from curiosity, tried wrapping 0000 steel wool around various things and running that in the area on a drill. No effect. I've made a polishing head and run it into the bore with Flitz polish to see it that would do anything. No change. So, as I said, I keep the bore clean and I don't worry myself with what it looks like.
Mike