AK47 Barrel..4150 Nitride OR CHF Chrome Lined.

[MountainRaven]

I don't believe there is enough hard data out there to say definitively either way which option is best.

However, as 7n6 stated my guess is that this question came about because you are comparing US made AK's to imported AK's. In that case barrel metallurgy and finish are only two of many factors that need to be taken into consideration.

Simply put, the safe bet is on an Arsenal, or a WASR if you don't want to spend as much. VEPR's are also good, but have a few quirks of their own. The American made AK market is all over the place right now and constantly changing.

To be entirely fair, the import market in the US is all over the place and constantly changing, too.

Arsenal availability is sporadic: SLR104s seem to be available in some places in some configurations. SLR106s were supposed to be discontinued four years ago, but are still available. And the only way to get a 12-ish-inch barrel project AK (the 7.62 and 5.45 caliber models having been unavailable for quite some time now). And SLR107s are simply not available - with the new SLR107-11s being largely vaporware (it seems like Rob Ski @ AKOU is the only person in the US who has one - the initial shipment sold out quickly and the subsequent shipments are somewhere in the ether).

922(r)'d VEPR rifles are a recent thing. And Saigas and Arsenal SGLs are gone, never to return. TVEPR may disappear, too, if Molot ends up being officially owned by Kalashnikov (although it's just as possible that Molot's bankruptcy might result in them officially owning Kalashnikov and Saigas once more being legal for import). IWI US's Galil ACE seems to be moderately available and I don't think that either the US importer/manufacturer or the Israeli-based parent company are likely to go out of business anytime soon, but their rifles weren't available three years ago. And then their pistols were available. And then they were recalled. And now they're back again.

Serbian guns seem to be somewhat available, some of the time, but have developed a reputation for being shoddily constructed - back to the days when they were Yugoslavian kit guns built by Century.

And WASRs were junk ten years ago, but today they're pretty respectable.

There were Polish Archer rifles in 5.56mm available from IO a couple of years ago, but those seem to have dried up. WBP is talking about importing complete rifles - although they'll have to find somebody to 922(r) them (and hopefully they can find somebody other than IO, Century, or Arsenal/FIME to import them.

Long-short: If you have an AK today, no matter where it was built or by whom, there is no guarantee that you will be able to replace it with even a similar rifle in as little as 12 months (or less, if you happen to buy the last of a particular run of guns and the next 18 months of production go to military contracts - or the manufacturer goes out of business or reorganizes).

[MOLON AABE]

Short answer, whatever barrel Jim Fuller puts in his AK's.

Velocitas, Opprimere,
Violentia Operandi

[MountainRaven]

Short answer, whatever barrel Jim Fuller puts in his AK's.

Velocitas, Opprimere,
Violentia Operandi

...Green Mountain?