I am looking at starting out in reloading for the 7mm saum I recently watched two reloading video’s Darrel Holland’s reloading for the long range shooter and Richard Franklin’s Precision reloading. Both these guys use an arbor press and Wilson seating dies. I like the idea of using a small portable arbor press. Unfortunately Wilson’s do not make a 7mm saum seating die. They will supply a blank and you can have a gun smith cut a chamber in it. I am currently using a factory remington barrel but will eventually shift to a custom barrel in this calibre. Has anyone tried this are there any pitfalls I should be aware of?

The other thing that intrigued me about Richard Franklins video was his attitude to case neck chamfering. He chamfers the outside but only polishes the case lip. He is very averse to chamfering the insides of case necks. What are peoples thoughts on chamfering the insides of cases?. He is also very anti any die with an expander ball, arguing that this messes with the inside of the neck and is tough on brass, shortening its life.

He uses the wilson neck sizing dies. It looked like a good idea in that with a few hand tools you could do some basic brass prep pretty much anywhere, without the need for a press. Again these are not available for the 7mm saum but they do make a 300 saum. Given that all the case dimensions between the 7mm saum and the 300 saum are the same except for the neck diameter could I use a bushing in this die of the appropriate diameter and expect this to work successfully as a 7mm saum neck sizing die, or am I missing something?

Another option is to use a redding S-type neck sizing die/bushes and toss the ball expander. I did some digging on this and it seems that some people have had concentricity and neck tension issues with this approach

Yet another approach would be to use a lee collet die, these are not made in 7mm saum, I would have to get a custom die made and you need to send them a couple of 1xfired cases. As I am intending to fit a custom barrel at some point, this seems a bit pointless at the moment, I’d prefer a factory set up.

Anyhow would be interested to here any ideas on necksizing/loading 7mm saum

If you are just starting out, I would get aset of regular full length dies & partial size w/ or w.o the expander. Try it both ways & see if it affects accuracy. It does in some rifles & not in others. Then you later you could get a custom neck sizing die made.

Precision shooters each develop their own methods, some of which are more superstition than anything else. But it works for them, or at least they will believe it does until they change their minds and adopt some new superstition. Not beveling the insides of case necks falls into the realm of superstition, in my opionion.

If you want to use a Lee Collet die, simply purchase one for a .300 WSM. If you use it as it comes out of the box it will leave a small segment of the lower portion of your neck unsized (some people regard this as a good thing -- more superstition). If you want it to resize the entire neck, then grind that much off of the lower end of the bushing that protrudes from the die. This will convert the die to essentially a 7mm SAUM die.

(I use a .222 Rem Lee Collet die modified in this same way to resize my .221 Fireball cases. Works like a charm.)

I know what you are saying about voodoo, however his argument that you don't need to chamfer brass for boat tailed bullets seems reasonable....

I could use a 7mm wsm (not 300 wsm, mandrel would be too thick) instead, but they don't do a 7mm wsm either....

i emailed Wilson they said that using a 300 saum with a 7mm bushing will work fine.

I also emailed Lee, they said they could make a collet dye set no problems, they need 2 once fired shells and a bullet.

My concern is will the die they come up with work OK on future custom chambers, and any type of bullet? I guess the case neck tension issue can be sorted by machining mandrels or buying a couple of extra custom mandrels? I would guess they need the bullet as you can only get the die as a custom set with a bullet seating die. Surely they don't need a bullet for making the neck die?

Sorry I mistyped -- I had meant 7mm WSM. I just assumed that Lee offers this caliber in the collet die, didn't know that it is not a standard item.

I don't think that you would have any problems using a custom Lee Collet die with another gun. The die doesn't touch the case body, anyway. So unless the brass you send them is excessively thick or excessively thin in the neck area, the die is going to be pretty standard.

I'm sure that Lee would build such a die set for you, but I did have a disappointment with the Lee custom service. I sent them two 7x33 Sako cases and asked for a Collet set. They returned my cases and check saying that they could not build a collet die this short.

If you are shooting a factory rifle with a factory chamber, I don't think you will gain much with the Wilson dies, "and a fine die they are". I have a Forrester neck die and a Hornady full length and they both do a great job. I know Hornady will make custom dies if you send in 3 pieces of fired brass, but truly I think you will be happy with off the shelf dies.

I will eventually move to new barrel, and I like the portability with the wilson dies/arbor press, if you have some prepped brass, scales, powder, and an autoprime you can pretty much reload anywhere.

I wont disagree with that.