Can some explain this to me like I have 5. I am genuinely curious but don’t have the knowledge to answer these questions. Why did Federal come out with a brand new cartridge in a 7 mm with a high pressure alloy case but only came out with a new round the 6.5 that is also a high pressure alloy case? Why didn’t they just make something new called the 6.5 Backcountry or alternatively why didn’t they use an already existing 7 mm and instead came out with something brand new in the 7 backcountry?
those are good questions… I’m sure there marketing team and lawyers are the ones who truly know…
Probably same reasons that Hornady it’s going to make the 25rd?
My 2 cents…they rolled it out this way because of what happened with the 7 BC. Nobody wants to buy into a cartridge that will die in a few years. If Federal created a completely new 6.5 cartridge, they’d have to convince people to: Buy new rifles, buy new dies, buy new magazines, buy new ammunition, AND because it’s a proprietary case design, you are completely reliant on Federal.By using an existing cartridge, which is one of the most popular out there, people will be more willing to give it a try. If they don’t like it, there are 100 other ammo options.
They probably also looked at the 6.5 market and went, “would a 6.5 BC distinguish itself enough for people to buy over a 6.5 CM or 6.5 PRC?”. I don’t think it would be enough to move the needle. A 20” 6.5 PRC shooting ELD-X out of a 20” barrel is going to be around 2,850 FPS…that’s pretty dang good for any realistic hunting range and be a good length for use with a suppressor. Maybe a 6.5 BC would have gotten you to a 16-18” barrel with the same MV, but that’s a lot of money for small gains.
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Personal opinion of course
When Federal specd out what it was looking to do with the 7 BC, the engineers said it would take a 30-06 size case to get the right amount of powder to get the performance metrics they were after. Ie, it needed to be a 280 Remington. The problem with creating a brand new 280 Remington case is that; 1. They’re just aren’t that many 280 Remington rifles around these days. It never was a popular round,2 what 280 rifles are around are many many decades old and might not be able to handle the higher pressure. 3 no one is actively making 280 rifle barrels right now
The only other case I think of that might have worked would be the 284 Winchester. That also is a rather obscure around without a lot of popularity, not many rifles, etc. A 7mm-08 would not have given them enough powder capacity to get their performance, a seven Magnum was more than they needed.
With the 6.5 creedmoor, you’ve got an absolute ton of rifles available, none of them are older than 2007, and they are being produced in droves right now. Makes perfect sense to do what they did. I wish they could have done that with a 7mm but I just don’t think there was an appropriate 7mm available
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Agree with this.
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