I agree the Krag is near the edge: I said "with a small margin," after all. A long throat chambering helps. Yes, it's close, but probably not close enough to be catastrophic. It could lead to frame stretch, but my experience with a good many near max loads hasn't led to that. I'm comfortable with it. You may not be. If that's the case, stick with something a bit less. I'm NOT comfortable with the Savage, as I think it's enough more than the Krag (which I think is on the edge, mind you) to be dangerous. In my view, if it's chambered to a factory round, then it needs to be safe, even if just barely, with factory ammunition. I personally believe that to be the case with the Krag and not with the Savage, hence my choices. I do have some engineering background (over 35 years) which helps me feel confident in these decisions, but I do NOT specialize in firearms, nor do I recommend you do something you don't feel comfortable with. I do not know the Contender limits versus case head size. I would expect the data attributed to Tim Pancurak to be a bit conservative for the reasons you indicate, and that a careful person could stretch them some without stretching a frame. How much is open to question. All engineering requires some assumptions, which would be classified by many people as a leap of faith, since we can never be absolutely sure the assumptions are valid. All I can say for sure is that so far it (the Krag) has worked for me on more than one Contender frame in both handgun and carbine configurations. If you decide not to accept the risks, that's fine. If you do decide to give it try, be careful and good luck.
RonF
