Just to finish my story...
I made another attempt to create a 50-50 burger. This time I used 93/7 ground beef mixed with the ground bacon and decided to fry it. I definitely smelled the bacon! I was so worried about undercooking the bacon that I ended up overcooking it and drying the burger out...but I could at least taste the bacon this time.
This was a lot of work. Next time I'll just leave the bacon as a topping.