Tstrenuous10:

I took some photos of my latest pistol with the nickel boron treatment, and e mailed them to myself but alas, I need to figure out the 'url' thing to download them here. I think I have to add them to Picassa or some such website first. The Missus is a computer engineer and will be home later, so maybe she'll do that for us.

Maybe even better, here's the site for the company that did my gun:
]www.wmdguns.com

WMD does S&W's M&P series, Glocks, etc. They're not the only folks--EXO is coming on strong, as is Failzero and I'm sure they're are others. I just googled 'nickel boron coating S&W pistols' and a bunch of stuff came up.

I like WMD's work--it's very attractive (I think) and while it's sort of a gold color that contrasts black very well, it's not gaudy--I don't feel like I've 'pimped out' my gun at all. It looks really sharp with the red Trijicon night sights it came with. call me Kermit--I'd rather have green Truglo TFO night sights on there, but I'm not sinking anymore $$$ into this one. (I always say that, especially to my wife--lol)

I was concerned that anything as hard as this -- it's said to be 40% harder than S&W's melonite or Glock's tenifer (there are always trade offs) might be brittle and I know that little piece of metal that shatters off can be lethal.

Typically the harder something is, the more brittle it is also. For example, I have some nice old obsidian (volcanic glass) Indian knives and some newer ceramic ones and they sure do hold a keen edge, but drop them and I'm crying over the pricey pieces.

Have a 'look see' on line and educate yourself. There are a fair amount of youtube videos of pistols, tactical rifles and such, that have been nickel boron coated and 'torture tested'. I can put over 2000 rounds through before I break down the gun and do some light cleaning--it cuts down on 'the funk' for sure and moving parts move faster and easier.

I don't think the nickel boron changes the tolerances of moving parts significantly and that's good, because perhaps the most accurate guns in the world are usually the ones with the tightest tolerances, but then again typically, a grain of sand or grit can hang them up. That's why you can drop an AK47 in the mud, pick it up and shoot it, but you do that with an AR15 and you just might need to say: "time out--I need to break this down and clean this, sir"--or else you just might be shooting air...Same thing with most 'high end' 45ACP 1911's.

As far as I know, this is pretty new technology for guns and only time will tell if it's a fad or the cutting edge, or at least until something else comes along. Don't buy anything on one guy's opinion. In certain environments, situations, I wouldn't want anything BUT a completely black gun and some people have found ways to change the color of guns with this treatment. But these are pretty for show, they work great for me and if you have to go out in the desert, they're very stealthy--I'll bet the boys 'over there' are loving this stuff--I know the Army Rangers I shoot with sometimes, are sweet on it and those guys live and die by their guns.