I have used new iron rings without honing many times on in chassis overhauls, i have seen much damage done from the remmants of honing in the chassis ---
I never had any problems from it
I have also reused rings, typically there is some oil consumption at first, the highest mileage rings I reused had over 300,000 miles on them --that car I only knew of it's use for 40,000 miles after, then it was wrecked
I bought a 420 Mercedes V8(with broken timing chain), it has aluminum bores like a vega has, took the rings off the pistons, cleaned the parts in a carb cleaner bath,put it back together, quart first 1500, then 3000 next quart, now 100,000 miles later it is about 2 quarts in 8000 miles
I bought a low mileage A engine at Hershey 2 years ago, still had 2 shims on each bearing , brand new rings, freshly cut ridge, honed, the babbitt is original intact, not worn, but it is full of silver specs, there was even a large chip from the ridge reamer that was rolling around the oil passage ---too big to get into the oil groove, when the babbitt is scraped the scrapings could be picked up with a magnet there is so much embedded honing debris
