Has anyone tried.....

[Doublezranch]

Hey guys,

Since Remington has decided to cut out the SAUM from their line up, brass has been a nightmare to find. I believe they stopped making runs on this brass 2 or more years ago. Since I have one of these guns, I, like everyone else have been buying brass whenever God throughs me a bone and I find some.

Now that the well is almost dry, I pose this question. Is it at all possible to take WSM brass and make it work in a SAUM? I know the dimentions are different, but are they so different that if can't be done??

Let me know what you think......it would be crazy awesome if there was a way!!

 

[Deleted member 46119]

Never tried it.

Looked at the specs. (AmmoGuide is now... "Interactive"!)

SAUM WSM
Rim .534 .535 same
Base .550 .550 same
Shoulder 1.5383 1.664 requires work
Len 2.015 2.010 close enough

It is my belief that it is possible.

It may take multiple steps to move the shoulder down .127. The more experience on that with big cases will have to comment.

 

[bigngreen]

It would work except that the WSM brass is very, very resistant to pushing back. I'm shooting a 6.5 SS which is a SAUM pushed back and blown out with a 40 degree shoulder, our original desire was to use Norma 270 WSM brass but all of the WSM brass is so thick and it's built with taper so if and when you do get a shoulder pushed back you then have major neck thickness issues, I did everything I could to get WSM brass to push back and it just does not happen well, annealing makes it worse also as the cases just collapse.

 

[Doublezranch]

Thanks Rhian. I was hoping you would chime in. Is there anyway you could turn the necks and/or ream them to thin them out??

 

[Mikecr]

It could be done, but as bigngreen implied it would take a plan and some work.

You would need a forming die to move the shoulder back.
These are tough to find these days. My kit came from Lee Six, including custom bushings for WSM sized cases.
Also, you would need deep precise annealing to mid-body without ruining the lower case.
This means lead dip.
Turning would be a must and doing so with such thick brass to begin is very challenging.
Biggest issue; turning mandrel fit. You can punch the donut outward and turn it off, and to do this means forming the entire neck a good bit undersize first, to setup for the expansion. But thick brass springs back more than normal, leaving very tight turning mandrel fit. So the lead dip would likely help with this.
Then I'd just jam fire-form to finish.


Remington's management must truly suck. They should not be rewarded.

 

[Lefty7mmstw]

would the chamber clean up with a wsm reamer??

midway has ammo in stock for both the 7 and 300 saum btw.... muck easier firing out factories than jumping through hoops brass forming IMO..

 

[Gunpoor]

Doublezranch, why don't you have the chamber of your rifle reamed to the WSM alternative. You didn't say what groove diameter your RSAUM is currently, but if you have the 300SAUM you could take it to a qualified smith and have it reamed to 300WSM. I have seen 300WSM brass for sale recently, and I like the cartridge.

 

[MontanaRifleman]

Hey guys,

Since Remington has decided to cut out the SAUM from their line up, brass has been a nightmare to find. I believe they stopped making runs on this brass 2 or more years ago. Since I have one of these guns, I, like everyone else have been buying brass whenever God throughs me a bone and I find some.

Now that the well is almost dry, I pose this question. Is it at all possible to take WSM brass and make it work in a SAUM? I know the dimentions are different, but are they so different that if can't be done??

Let me know what you think......it would be crazy awesome if there was a way!!

I would use a double radius shoulder forming die, like a Weatherby. I ordered one of those from Whidden for my 270 Montana. I should be getting it soon and I could use it on a 300 Rum case to see how far I can push the shoulder back.