My apologies, Mike, et. al. I got a roll and made some tests with it, and then was hijacked by more pressing deadline work and didn't follow up here.
Overall, I'm quite impressed with it. In looking at a the gamut of the profile that I made for it, it's not anything to get excited about, but in real world eyeball tests I don't see it obviously lacking anywhere.
The surface is quite nice, with a very pleasing texture, and the refractive quality of the pearlescent base puts it into a different realm than other canvases, so it's really hard to compare gamut visually, anyway.
The most surprising thing about it for me is that the ink seems to dry immediately, vs. rather slowly like the IJ Technologies AGX metallic canvas. It acts like some of the microporus coated RC type inkjet papers (which include the Mitsubishi made metallic inkjet papers, IMO), in that the ink locks into the surface of the substrate and has a very durable bond without any coating. Hahnemuhle apparently recommends agains coating it, presumably because that kills some of the pearlescent qualities. I was aghast at that idea at first, but a stretch test for cracking and a fingernail scratch test have me convinced that it would not be foolhardy to leave it uncoated (unlike, say, the BC gloss canvas). The main argument for coating would be for ink permanence and atmospheric protection, but I'm leaning towards just trusting Hahnemuhle's reputation and their R & D department. I'd love to see an independent test of print permanence on it, of course, but I'm not expecting to see anything anytime soon.
I print with an HP and Vivera ink and found a slight sheen differential from heavily to lightly coated areas. In some cases, that might be an advantage, but for most cases I prefer the more uniform surface I got by using gloss enhancer when printing, which does not seem to kill the metallic properties. I have no idea if Epson or Canon inks would look the same or not. I printed with PK ink.
The canvas has a nice weight, and only a minimal propensity for curling (again, unlike the AGX metallic canvas).
Regarding the degree of "metallic" properties that one gets from a finished print, it's not blow your doors off strong, but neither are the other metallic canvases. I would think that with the wrong image, you might need to tell someone that it was supposed to be metallic, in fact. That said, with the right image, especially ones with high contrast and saturated but lighter value blues and yellows, it has a unique feel that does emulate the metal print look somewhat.
I plan to do more experimenting as soon as I have the opportunity, and have committed enough to it that I've ordered a 44" wide roll for further testing. I was not really promoting metallic canvas to speak of with the previous options that were available, but think that I can endorse this material enough that I will be suggesting it to clients soon.
Any other questions, or areas I haven't covered that I can shed light on for you?