I guess I would really like to know what would make BPI think that a stainless barrel needed a colored weather shield finish. Weather Shield will eventually wear or chip and when it does how do you fix it. If it were left as a regular stainless barrel it would be easy to maintain over time.

The more I think about it the less I do like it... It just reduces my options to much.

As someone has already suggested there are many different 416 stainless formulations and a company can spec what they might want - so is the 416 that BPI is using a really dull or really bright natural finish that needs to be covered?

I know I am cynical about BPI but are they really trying to hide something that is not normal with a normal weapons grade stainless that we would expect to see?