Well I'm glad to see at least one of you has the new 700 and likes it. I ordered one last week and should be here any day. Still don't understand how it's super strong, and western is working up a new MAX load chart just for this gun and yet everyone says it will not handle a small smokeless load, like the IMR-4227 That savage recommends for theirs.
The Johnson guy that invented this breech plug, did he invent it for smokeless guns or just BP?
The Johnston plug was designed to shoot 777 pellets out of his gun. Previously, all production attempts to use and burn a 4-pellet load with a 209 primer failed. Though use of a weaker LRM primer, the Johnston design maximized use of the primer by directing 100% of the fire directly into the breech plug fire channel. The 209 systems required a void to be filled prior to the fire being pushed into the fire channel, which resulted in a loss of efficiency. Remington bought this system to use in their production muzzleloader, and it appears they intended to capitalize on the hype of igniting a 4-pellet load of 777. But, Remington also intended the rifle to be used with the popular BH209 sub, so they further modified the system in materials and design to reduce and/or eliminate the erosion issues experienced with the original design. But even with these improvements, the pressure limits of the design to seal between the nipple and casing, fall within the pressure limits of blackpowder and blackpowder subs. Even within those pressures, the design has limits to the point the seal fails and the nipple begins to erode. This seal, with its production tolerances, between the casing and nipple, in addition to the design of the fire channel itself, is not up to par to withstand the increased pressures of a smokeless charge. Though the materials themselves within the Remington are as strong as it gets, these design limitations would likely erode and fail in relative quick order, which would likely be hazardous to users and bystanders.
In relation to the Charlie Baltz ignition system, his is custom built with specific tolerances around a specific 45 caliber sabot-less smokeless load. Even with his system, use outside his strict smokeless guidelines could be catastrophic. Experimenting with his system is foolish, and using his system as an excuse to experiment with the Remington is far outside the bounds logic and common sense.
If looking for a sound method to address a desire to safely shoot smokeless from the Remington with the factory 50 caliber barrel, then one would need to explore having one of the established smokeless builders to manufacture a drop in breech plug which utilizes one of the proven 209 modules which will reliably seal at the higher pressures resulting from smokeless. The factory Remington is built around a CNC machined user friendly replaceable breech plug that does not require any adjustment for headspace. A builder could take advantage of this by adapting a different ignition system which is plug and play. If this was done, then one could maintain the rifle as factory stock and shoot certain smokeless loads, either full bore sabot-less, or sabot loads like the old Savage. This may be something that comes down the pike if there is a demand from end-users. If on the other hand you merely wish to convert the gun over to a dedicated smokeless gun, well this has already been accomplished numerous times by changing barrels and converting the gun to a 45 caliber sabot-less smokeless using various proprietary 209 module systems. Several builder have done this already.
Best
