Federal introduces 7mm Backcountry

270WSMXBolt said:
I find it interesting that he says the don't recommend trying to reload the non smooth finish cases. No mention of annealing and case life.
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No mention of trimming cases, no mention of “crimping” back the flared case mouth, and nothing like the multiple steps everyone was talking about when it first came out!!
 
Call me skeptical but I'm not exactly trusting Federal on the matter when others are saying it takes more work. Time will tell though, hopefully it won't be too long before all the gear is available for reloaders and we get confirmation on what is required.
 
I'm gonna go out on a limb and say I doubt Federal would put out a video like this if they weren't fairly confident it was going to be this doable. What's to be gained in the long run for them if they're hiding required steps? I mean yes they could sell a few more rifles before word got around that the process they showed didn't actually work that well but it would be a PR nightmare once people realized the truth.
 
yidava25 said:
I'm gonna go out on a limb and say I doubt Federal would put out a video like this if they weren't fairly confident it was going to be this doable. What's to be gained in the long run for them if they're hiding required steps?
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I see it from the other way - whats to be gained in the short term by them hiding extra steps? Adoption of this new cartridge they no doubt put a ####load of money into developing.

Alternatively, Why would others be telling us it takes multiple passes if that is not true? I can't think of a good explanation of that.
 
Suther said:
I see it from the other way - whats to be gained in the short term by them hiding extra steps? Adoption of this new cartridge they no doubt put a ####load of money into developing.

Alternatively, Why would others be telling us it takes multiple passes if that is not true? I can't think of a good explanation of that.
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The only short-term gain I can see would be that if they roped hordes of people into buying a rifle in this chambering (mostly higher-end rifles from what I've seen offered) with one of the major selling features being that it would be easily reloadable, and it turned out not to be that easy, they may think these folks would keep the rifle and just settle for buying more factory ammo.
As for those saying it takes X number of passes to size the cases, is there perhaps something different about the die set the guy in the video has vs those used by others up to this point? That's pretty much the only explanation I've got.
 
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Specifically, what extra steps are required? Has anyone produced a video or a concise essay on using extra steps to reload this cartridge?

The only extra step I see in the Federal video is to expand the case mouth a bit, something that is often not done with bottleneck hunting cartridges. With a harder steel case I can see why flaring the mouth may be desirable to avoid bullet damage and/or requiring excessive force to seat the bullet.

I don't see anything wrong with the Federal video at all. Steel cases are less pliable than brass but a reloading press has the ability to apply tremendous force to size a case- brass or steel.

I wouldn't be surprised if the resizing die uses a hard carbide insert or similar, which isn't the norm for most bottleneck cases but they certainly exist. I have carbide .223 dies for example.
 
Soon after the cartridge was announced people were claiming that "they heard" that it took as many as 14-15 passes through a sizing die to get the case within spec. Those are the only extra steps I've heard about before this video from Federal.
 
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DGY said:
No mention of trimming cases, no mention of “crimping” back the flared case mouth, and nothing like the multiple steps everyone was talking about when it first came out!!
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I would say trimming is going to be like any other case. Trim when required. it's possible that the steel doesn't flow as much and trimming is mostly unnecessary. The seating die should be able to take care of any "crimp" required.
 
ChewyChewbacca said:
I’m asking to be excused for my ignorance in advance.
My question: is it the steel case that keeps the pressure from blowing back past the primer into the bolt face?
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Brass or steel case- they both contain the pressure. This alloy steel they are using supposedly contains pressure much better than traditional brass or steel cases, so they can increase the pressure rating.
 
Suther said:
I see it from the other way - whats to be gained in the short term by them hiding extra steps? Adoption of this new cartridge they no doubt put a ####load of money into developing.

Alternatively, Why would others be telling us it takes multiple passes if that is not true? I can't think of a good explanation of that.
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Who are these “others”?
 
pathfinder76 said:
Who are these “others”?
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This:
jethro66 said:
From Outdoor life about reloading
"I know that RCBS is working on reloading dies for the 7 BC, and I’m eager to try them. But from what I’ve heard from RCBS, the dies are having trouble resizing the cases. In order to get them back to their original factory size they need to be run through the die multiple times — more than a dozen cycles, in fact."

"If that remains the case, then the appeal of the 7 BC for reloaders will be significantly diminished."
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RCBS has made dies for the cartridge although they may have not hit the open market yet. I'm waiting for some input from Ultimate Reloader to make further judgment. I don't know if this link has been shown so sorry if it's a duplicate. I don't see the advantage as we can't use a suppressor.
 
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Suther said:
Alternatively, Why would others be telling us it takes multiple passes if that is not true? I can't think of a good explanation of that.
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Because they don't know schit about schit.


My best guess would be something like this:

Outdoor Life probably talked to some media/PR type that is far removed from engineering and machining and he only had some really basic knowledge. It's quite possible RCBS decided to start with a baseline and just make a normal set of dies and see what happens. And what happened is it took multiple attempts to resize the dies. And that's all the PR guy had heard.

So armed with this baseline knowledge, RCBS was able to create a die system using the proper materials (perhaps carbide inserts) and proper dimensions and maybe some other adaptations not mentioned. So now they have made a die system that works for this cartridge and Outdoor Life didn't check back with PR guy.

it's obvious they already have made some changes compared to a regular die set as they expand the mouth to seat the bullet. Expansion is rarely performed as a separate operation for bottleneck cartridges and jacketed bullets on a single stage press. I will use an M die to give a little expansion when using a progressive press but that's more so the bullet is easily dropped into the case by the bullet feeder than any other reason.

In the end we probably will see a 3 or even 4 die set with the sizing die made out of a non standard material and some slightly different features than a regular die. And an expansion die and then either a seat/crimp die or a seat die and a crimp die.

I doubt very much Federal sees any value in trying to deceive their customers by putting out a fake video about how it is straightforward to reload the 7BC. Just the opposite, I would think they want to be as transparent as possible.
 
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