I'm basically wondering...do these provide any benefits to accuracy or anything, or are they just aesthetic + reduce rust?

Accuracy is stainless steels forte.

Most all of the "varmint/DCM/CMP/service rifle" type ARs have stainless steel barrels, of varying manufacture's.

Almost all, precision rifles with custom Lilja, Krieger, Hart, Wilson whoever's barrels are made in stainless steel. While they have a somewhat shorter "throat" life-span, thus equated by most as as shorter life, they can be re-throated and survive to shoot again and again, till barrel gets too short.

Hope this helps ya, if your interested in ARs as a SHTF or plinking type rifle, "go chrome or go home" comes from the fact that chrome lined chambers and bores while somewhat less accurate, have much longer lifespans amd are easier to maintain.

Mike

I have run across the Lilja website before and they seem to have some very high quality barrels (not to mention very informative long range shooting articles :D)

what about the stainless steel makes it more accurate?  the reason I ask is because I wasn't sure if I should order the AR10A4 with stainless steel or not.  so If I did get stainless steel, it would not be one of the industry standard stainless steel barrels, it would be armalites.  could i expect to see significant improvement from that one?  because on their website they did not list a separate MOA statisitc for the stainless steel version.  the regular version shoots 1.5-2 MOA...but the AR10(T) shoots 1 MOA, and has a stainless steel barrel.  do you think a large portion of the AR10(T)'s improved performance is due to it having a stainless steel barrel?

and when you say the lifespan is shortened...how many rounds do you mean approximately?  1,000?  10,000?  100,000?

thanks for your help!

Stainless is not more accurate defacto.  If you want to go from 1.2 MOA to 1.1 MOA then eliminating chrome and going stainless might be a good thing.  The difference is that stainless is easier to machine and therefore you can get a more consistant cut on the barrel rifling in MATCH BARRELS.  If you use a match barrel you will have better accuracy.  The stainless barrel you are looking at is not a high quality match barrel.  Also the chrome bore and chamber are more resistant to corrosion than uncoated dtainless steel.  You will be sacrificing the low friction chromed chamber which aids reliability.  My suggestion is to either buy a real match barrel for accuracy or go with the chrome lined for reliability and corrosion resistance.

I don't have any stainless AR barrels, but I have several stainless hunting rifles.  I am not sure why, but stainless barrels seem to clean up easier than chrome-moly or chrome lined ones.

SS is lightyears better than ChromeMoly.  A SS match grade barrel will clean in 2-4patches.  They produce outstanding accuracy and the potential for corrosion is slim to none.

The Krieger double cryoed hand lapped SS barrels offer accurate life similar to Chrome lined barrels. 4,700 rds is Kriegers claim but in reality the barrels often shoot better than chrome-lined non match grade barrels to 10,000rds and more.

RRA makes a great SS DCM barrel in 1/8in twist.

Les Baer's SS barrels are excellent also (I would buy the cut-rifled one but there are also button rifled barrels for those of you that are button rifled fans).

Armalite makes excellent SS barrels that come from the factory hand lapped (internally polished) for ease of cleaning and superior accuracy.

Wislon SS (like from Model 1 Sales) is the cheapest SS barrel on the market and though it is cheaper than others it is only slightly better than ChromeMoly.


"If you want to go from 1.2 MOA to 1.1 MOA "

In my experience a Free floated SS match barrel from Krieger, Les baer, RRA or Armalite will do 1/2MOA or less at 100yds.

To clarify the barrel on the stainless AR10T and the AR10 flat top can have barrels that are nowhere near the same.  Putting a Krieger in the same league with all the other generic stainless barrels is ludricrous.  Bushmaster stainless is not very accurate in my experience for example.  With barrels you get what you pay for.  A cheap stainless barrel will not be more accurate than a milspec barrel.  A true target barrel will.  Then again a true match grade barrel that is chrome lined like the FN SPR barrel will also shoot 1/2 MOA.  My point is to not associate chrome with inaccurate and stainless with accurate because is a false relationship.  The quality of the barrel in question is what matters.