No factory ammo.

Interesting. Different manuals give different numbers. My Hornady book says 2.850. Either way, it's just a reference for factory ammo. Most of my other rifles are seated longer than SAAMI spec. I believe, for handloading, what counts is not jamming into the lands and ensuring that feeding is reliable, then adjusting to find a sweet spot.

papa, no offense but you'll never find a manual that shows the OAL for a 7mm08 is 2.850, as they are all based on SAAMI specs. Any of the manuals will show the exact same numbers wp's example showed. That's the standard. Good luck.

The Hornady manual lists the length of the 162 amax at 2.850”. Other similar bullets that have a long ogive to tip length will seat longer than the standard 2.800”. Otherwise the ogive of the case will be below the case mouth.

It helps to know which exact bullet you are loading. Some bullets will have a short ogive to tip length and will touch the lands or into them at 2.800” or a little less. I was loading a 140 grain Sierra game king for an AR and the bullet was touching the rifling at 2.780”, so I seated it a touch deeper.

Also, if you are using a tangent ogive bullet, the seating depth isn’t as big a deal, since tangent ogive bullets are not finicky on seating depth.

No offense taken. Thanks for the info. However, looking in my own manuals, Hornady (which I was using) says 2.850, Nosler says 2.800, Speer says 2.800. For .243 Win, Hornady says 2.650, Nosler and Speer both say 2.710. For four other cartridges I load, they are all the same. Go figure!

...but, back to the original problem, I still can't find my 7-08 lands like I have on every other one I load. Looks like I have two options: have the chamber checked out by a gunsmith and/or try loading a little shorter to see if groups get tighter.

Thanks.

Am I overlooking what bullet your using?

If you are not going to load into the lands then what difference does it make where they are just load shorter than what you're measurement is.

Yes, I misspoke and stand corrected. Depending on the manual used, different OAL's are used depending on the bullet. I should have said the case dimensions, etc are SAAMI spec'd. Thanks for pointing that out Chad.

Starting with Hornady 139 gr BTSP.

My experience has been that I frequently get my best groups around 0.010" off the lands, but not always. Right now I don't know if I'm 5 or 50 or 100 thousandths off the lands. I want to be able to touch the lands and measure back from there.

My 8th edition Hornady has that bullet shorter. Oddly enough the 162 Amax Chad mentioned being longer is also only 2.800” in this book. A lot of different information out there.

I would definitely think that bullet would have marks from engaging the lands.

You can have your chamber checked if you want, but as long as the rounds load into the mag and you're getting the accuracy/speed you want, then a little bit of a delta from the book value wouldn't make me lose a minute of sleep.

There are many bullets that have a long ogive to tip length that physically can not be seated at the recommended standard SAAMI max length. The ogive of the bullet would be seated below the case mouth. Almost all of these bullets are heavy for caliber, and high BC bullets. To get a high BC, the ogive to tip length is generally longer. This increases the COAL of the round. Add a polymer tip to the bullet, and it increases your COAL even more.

Here's a picture I like to use. You have 2 bullets seated to the same ogive, but one is longer than the other due to the longer tip to ogive length. Now imagine one bullet being a lead soft point with a short ogive to tip length, and the other bullet a heavy, high BC bullet with a long ogive to tip length. If you seated both bullets to the same ogive, the heavy, high BC bullet would have a much longer COAL, and be longer than SAAMI length. There's no problem with that, other than getting it to feed out of certain rifle magazines. Most of these rifles are set up to allow for these longer lengths.

And it wasn't the Hornady manual, but the Hodgdon manual that lists 2.875" COAL for the 162 A-max.

If you looks at the numbers, you can figure it out. For example, the 162 A-max has an ogive to tip length of .750". The 7-08 has a max case length of 2.035". If you add 2.035 and .750", you get 2.785" length if you seated the bullet at the ogive of the case mouth. If you seat the bullet at 2.800", the ogive is only .015" from the case mouth. With an Rt/R number at .55, this bullet is VERY secant and will be seating depth sensitive. So, seating this bullet at the 2.800" will have a long jump to the rifling. If you can seat it out further closer to the rifling, it will certainly reduce how finicky the load will be and help with accuracy.

I'll throw a curve ball at you here. Tell me how this works. Berger lists their data for the 300 Win Mag and 230 Berger with a COAL length of 3.340". This is standard max length for a SAAMI round. The max case length for the 300 Win Mag is 2.620". The Berger 230 Hybrid has a tip to ogive length of .859". Add those together and you get 3.479" COAL if you seat the bullet's ogive at the case mouth. If you were to seat this bullet at 3.340" which is listed in the Berger manual, the ogive of the bullet would be .139" into the case mouth. So the bullet would be seated so deep that you would have a large gap at the case mouth from the bullet being too deep into the case.

My point is, use reloading manuals as a guide. Don't use them as a Bible. But be smart about your approach with powder and bullet seating depth amounts.

^^Excellent summary of the point so many of us are trying to convey.

Seems to me we have gotten off topic.

The OP's question appears to be he is finding a length but believes it to be something other than the lands the bullet is contacting as it is not leaving marks.

Maybe the op can qualify that.

Exactly. Thanks.

I was thinking we were on topic, and I guess unappreciated. From the post below sighting different COAL from each manufactures' manual does not help in this case when loading a Hornady bullet. The 139 grain Hornady BTSP is not a seating depth sensitive bullet anyway. So touching the lands, off the lands or even a jump to the lands will all still work well with the right load. And that bullet has these nice little marks around the bullet called a cannelure that tells you where to seat that particular bullet. This thread has plenty of info to assist in finding the lands if you know how to do it. My method is fool proof, and works like a charm if you know how to do it. So, if our posts are off topic and not welcome, GLTY. I'm out.

Some of yal are so quick to know what all the answers are you don't stop to figure out what the question being asked really is.

The lands have always left marks for me using a similar/same approach. I now use a Hornady comparator to measure it and just go with that.

Thanks for all the wisdom.

Good post Judd. Thanks for sharing that with us.

Papa45,
Your bullet may be whopper jawed in the split case and binding before you reach the lands. I had the same issue some time ago with a Savage model 16 and a Hornady comparator. Roll the split case on a flat surface and adjust the bullet till there is no wobble. Then stand the rifle vertical and see if you can find the lands. It worked in my model 16.
If that does not work, Judds method should.

Judd - that's an awesome video. I'm gonna have to try that. I agree that the accuracy of my Hornady comparator is really poor. Trying to nail down even within a few thousandths is extremely difficult, and I'll go so far as to say impossible from a true precision standpoint. It's not uncommon for me at all to get readings 15 or 20 thousands apart on consecutive trials.