stainless steel-vs-matte-vs-polished blue

[fabsroman]

Originally Posted by hunt4ever

I'm a new member to this forum and I'm looking for some advice regarding types of barrels. I recently purchased a 700 cdl 264 win mag with 26" matte finish fluted barrel. I had originally planned to have it polished to a high blue finish. My questions are: Do you think stainless steel barrels are better regarding longer life and greater accuracy? and Do you think stainless barrels are more visible to deer when hunting?

To quote my cousin Vinny:

"Imagine you're a deer. You're prancing along, you get thirsty, you spot a little brook, you put your little deer lips down to the cool clear water... BAM! A bullet rips off part of your head! Your brains are laying on the ground in little bloody pieces! Now I ask ya. Would you care what kind of barrel the guy who shot you was using?"

All kidding aside, I do most of my deer hunting with a Ruger 77MKII in .300 Win Mag with a stainless steel barrel. The barrel is polished compared to the stainless steel barrel on my Ruger 77MKIITGT .220 Swift, but it doesn't gleem
in the sunlight all that much. I have killed plenty of deer with the rifle anywhere between 15 yards and 250 yards, and I have yet to see a deer spook before I shot it. With the real close shots, most of the problem is bringing the rifle around to make the shot. With the long shots, most of the problem is the distance. A couple of years ago I had to run 100+ yards, with an unloaded rifle of course, to get the angle on a pair of deer that were running. If they were paying attention, they would have seen me, but I seriously doubt they are all that worried about people 350 yards away. I killed one right before it jumped the stream and I killed the other right after it jumped the stream. That was at 250 yards.

Honestly, I don't think the finish of the barrel really matters unless it is diamond coated throughout and reflects light like crazy.