DR KILL: I also have a stainless Omega .50 and it is very tight to load. I have found loads that work and at one time I even slugged the bore as I was sure there was something wrong as I had stuck some sabots part way down the barrel before finding the ones that would work. I did decide that 777 was not a powder that my Omega would use as the crud ring would form so bad I could not push anything past it and usually had to use a brass brush to get it out. If you feel that the bottom of the barrel is smaller than the upper portion I would run a slug of lead from the muzzle to the bottom of the barrel and measure it then run another lead slug the other way and see if there is a difference in slug measurements. If the pure lead is soft enough it should deform enough to fill the bore either direction and if that does not work just start one in the first four or five inches of the muzzle and push it back out and compare that one with the one from the bottom of the bore. Mine measures .500 at both ends of the barrel when it is completely clean and after some passes with JB bore paste. I did run 200 passes with the JB on a patch over a brass brush and that seemed to help loading quite a bit. I personally believe the stainless barrels are a little rougher inside than the blued barrels as stainless tends to machine rougher when viewed microscopically. I also agree that the Powerbelts should load fairly easy however. I cannot load Hornady SST bullets without switching to the Harvester short sabots and then they load fairly hard but not impossible. I do understand somewhat the difficulty you are mentioning but I am not quite as bad off as what you are expressing. Hope this helps as I know it is frustrating. If you want an easy loading rifle you should look for a White. I understand that they load all day long without a swab no matter what you use for powder as long as you use the White bullets. I will have to get one of those someday.