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• Unlike Parkerizing, it also hardens the steel tremendously and gives it a high lubricity — that is, makes it slick. A nitrided barrel gains interior hardness comparable to a chrome-lined one, without the impact on accuracy, since the process hardens the steel surface instead of depositing another surface over it.

• The chrome lining helps the barrel to resist the extreme heat and stresses of full-auto fire. It also makes it easier to clean, as the vapor deposits don’t have much to cling to on the mirrorlike chrome surface.

• Stainless barrels can be had in a few different surface finishes: Polished, satin, or bead blasted. They’re all the same metal, but a polished barrel is pretty close to mirror-smooth and highly reflective.

Cryo Treatment Process Cryogenic barrel treatment utilizes liquid nitrogen to bring the temperature of the gun barrel down to -300°F. The gun barrel is kept at this level for 24 hours to relieve residual stresses created during manufacturing. Cryogenic treatment is a one-time, permanent process.

Of the three, a polished finish is the easiest to clean, because there isn’t much on the surface for dirt to cling to. As the finish gets “flatter”, it gets a little harder to clean. Good thing these barrels are stainless because if they were CMV, the microscopic pits are where rust would start.

If you want something closer to a flat finish, some shops will blast a barrel with tiny glass beads under high pressure. The result is a flat light silver-grey surface, which doesn’t reflect much at all. It’s not real pretty, but it’s a lot less obvious.

Most expert shooters will tell you that a chrome-lined barrel won’t shoot as well as an otherwise identical barrel without the chrome. But they shoot well enough for most purposes, and they last longer than bare steel. As we mentioned earlier, some barrels are chrome lined to double thickness, which would be about 1/5000th of an inch.