The 221 Fireball Remington. The small but mighty cartridge

With the popularity of varmint hunting over the last few years, the Remington 221 Fireball has been coming back with some demand. Remington Arms Company created this special cartridge for their single-shot bolt-action pistol, the XP-100. Remington had the 222 Remington but decided it did not need as much powder capacity for a firearm with a shorter barrel to perform. Most pistol barrels ranged from 2 inches to 12 inches, but some up to 16 inches for use in competition. Therefore, Remington came out with the 221 fireball to optimize performance in the pistols to help achieve complete powder burn in the shorter barrels. They did so by shortening the case length from 1.700 inches on the 222 Remington to 1.400 inches on the 221 Fireball, which reduces the case capacity by five grains of powder compared to the parent case the 222 Remington. And just like that Remington has a new cartridge! Rumor has it they got the name for the cartridge from the fireball that was coming out of the shorter pistol barrels.

In 1985 Remington halted production of the XP-100 in 221 Fireball. Thompson Center made a few various single-shot pistols chambered for the 221 Fireball as part of their Contender and Encore series. These were break-action pistols and rifles, different than the Remington XP-100 which was a bolt-action handgun. Rifles chambered for the 221 Fireball include the Remington 700 with a few options for barrels and CZ made a 527 featuring a micro-Mauser action with a Turkish walnut American pattern stock along with a five-round detachable box magazine and a barrel length of 21.8 inches. Far as I know, those are the two rifle manufacturers that ever made the 221 Fireball factory option. It would be really sweet if Howa chambered this in their Mini Action, but as of now if you want that option you will have to work with a gunsmith. But I do feel that’s how the bolt action market is going these days with more and more custom rifles being made up each day!

When thinking about what cartridge to pick for varmint hunting. There are a lot of great ones to pick from, like

204 Ruger, 22-250 Remington and 223 Remington but if you want a little cartridge that is efficient and can push 35-grain bullets to a 55-grain max and use little amounts of powder and still pick off groundhogs at 250 yards. The 221 Fireball is a great option, the cool name is just an added bonus.

There are a few factory ammo options on the market, Hunting Shack Munitions (HSM) loads 221 Fireball using the 55-grain Hornady V-Max. This is one of the heavier bullet options for factory ammo with a velocity advertised at 2,750 FPS (Feet per Second) and muzzle energy of 924 foot-pounds. This is a great bullet option highly accurate and will expand at velocities as low as 1600 FPS, it’s also a great option for guys that want to keep the pelt on a coyote as I have only seen this bullet exit a few times. The second option is Remington Premier Varmint Ammunition using the 50-grain AccuTip Boat Tail, this is the second heaviest factory option that I am aware of. Remington advertises velocities at the muzzle of 2,995 FPS and muzzle energy of 996 foot-pounds. I have not shot this ammo as it’s been impossible to get the last three years, so I can’t say how they perform. Nosler offers two options for the .221 Rem Fireball which are my choice for factory offerings. They are a go-to for varmints out to 250 yards. The first option is the Nosler Varmageddon using the 40-grain polymer tipped flat base Varmageddon bullet with muzzle velocities advertised at 3100 FPS and muzzle energy of 853 foot-pounds. Option two for Nosler is Varmageddon 221 Remington Fireball 40 grain hollow point flat base with muzzle velocities advertised as at 3100 FPS and muzzle energy of 853 foot-pounds. The main difference between the two factory-loaded options is the Ballistic Coefficient (B.C.). The Nosler 40-grain polymer tip flat base has a G1 B.C. of .211 and the 40-grain hollow point flat base has a B.C. of .158, therefore if you will be shooting in any wind with any distance past 100 yards or more you will be slightly better off going with the Nosler 40 grain polymer tip flat base because that bump in B.C. will help fight the wind from pushing you off target.

The 221 Fireball is just a sweet little speedy fun round to shoot. My rifle a CZ527 retains all of the features that made it famous, from its forged square bridge receiver and controlled round feed claw extractor to its single set trigger by pushing the trigger forward till it stops, at that point, it’s a hair trigger to what the user has set it at and hammer forged barrel, the barrel comes free floated for the factory. The barrel has a 1:12 rifle twist, so it can stabilize the 35 to 55-grain bullets. I had a three-port break put on the end of it from Benchmark Barrels, with that on the end of the barrel makes the gun not move off target so can spot impacts and watch that groundhog take a dirt nap and move on to his body next to him. Having the five-round detachable box magazine is nice for sitting on a bench and picking off groundhogs at 200 yards, when the mag is empty just slap a new loaded one in the gun and back to slaying groundhogs. To top off the rifle is a Leupold VX-2 Rifle Scope 4-12x 40mm Matte finish, this is a great optic for the use of the rifle. It allows me to engage targets up close and at practical ranges for most varmint-hunting situations.

Handloading for the 221 fireball is where you can make this cartridge shine. With a great variety of varmint bullets to pick from like Hornady V-Max, Nosler Varmageddon, Barnes VARMIN-A-TOR, FB Varmint, and Sierra SPT Varminter this bullet is a little hard and will not expand well at lower velocities. There also is a good amount of load data out there for pistol data and rifle data, in Hornady load manual 11th edition they have two different sections for pistol and rifle data. A great source for data is also LoadData.com. It’s a go-to source for me when I need to start looking at what powder I might want to try. There are a lot of great powders for this cartridge but the two I have had the best luck with are Alliant Reloader 7 and IMR-4198. Alliant Reloader 7 has proven to be a great shooting powder with all bullet weights for 35 grain to 55 grains, it also produces the best velocities but IMR-4198 is right behind it. Shooters world offers a few great powder options as well. When it comes to brass Remington, Lapua and Nosler make it and all are great options. I have seen some people use 300 Blackout brass when they have not been able to get factory bass. I have found that when it comes to primers this cartridge is not too sensitive as I have tested 5 different well-known brands and the only thing it impacted was the point of impact on a developed load. Brass life so far as I have seen last and long time as long as you anneal, Primer pockets have stayed nice and tight from my loading. In my experience, the point of failure has been splitting of necks, after several firings.

Reloading for the 221 fireball is pretty straightforward. I start the same way no matter if I am starting with new brass or fired. Start by inspecting the case for any nicks, cracks, or dents that might concern me. Then I anneal each case mouth and wet tumble for one hour to get any contaminant off the case then it goes into the air dryer for two more hours. After drying, I put all my clean and shiny brass into trays and they’re ready for sizing. To complete this operation a full-length sizing die from Lee Precision was used but the expander ball was removed, cases must be lubed prior to re-sizing.

After all the cases have been full-length sized it’s time to switch over to an expander mandrel from 21st Century Innovation, there are a lot of great companies that make these. I use a .222 size mandrel for most .224 caliber cartridges that I load for, seems to work out to be the best overall. once those have been run through the mandrel it’s time to check with a pin gauge to make sure the brass is set right. After we confirm that all case mouths are properly expanded it’s time to check case length to see if trimming is required. After trimming the case mouth is deburred and chamfered. I then put the brass into a dry tumbler with large grain rice for 30 minutes to clean the lube off the brass and inside of the necks. This saves time from wiping each case individually with a rag to remove the lube. Once the 30 minutes are up it’s time to prime each case. As stated previously this cartridge does not seem to be too picky when it comes to primers. However, the best results in the test rifle were with CCI #400 primers in regards to Consistent velocity and group size. Once primed the cases are ready to be charged and a bullet seated on top of that. No crimp is needed as the neck tension is already set using the expander mandrel and all loads were tested using a bolt action rifle.

A few loads stood out to me during testing they are as follows. Using the 35-grain Hornady NTX with 15.5 grains of IMR 4227 powder, and case overall length 1.750, the average velocity was 3345 FPS (Feet Per Second) this was below Hornady load data max, and there were no pressure signs. With the Hornady 40-grain VMAX with 18.5 grains of Alliant Reloader 7 powder and case overall length 1.830, average velocities was 3067 FPS. The load using the Hornady 45 grain Hornet with 17.3 grains of IMR 4198 powder, and case overall length of 1.825”, average velocities was 3078 FPS. This is at Hornady max load data and I did notice a little primer cratering with this load. The load using the Hornady 50 grain SP with 18.5 grains of Alliant Reloader 7 powder, and case overall length of 1.825”, average velocities was 3050 FPS. This load is a maximum load and did not exhibit any pressure signs. This brings us to the Hornady 55-grain VMAX with 13.5 grains of IMR 4227 powder and case overall length of 1.830”, average velocities were 2681 FPS. This was below Hornady's max load data, there were no signs of pressure.

Moving on from Hornady bullets to Nosler bullets. The Nosler 40-grain Ballistic Tip Varmint with 14.0 grains of Winchester 296 powder and case overall length of 1.830”, the average velocity was 3012 FPS. This was at Nosler max load data, but in my gun, I saw no signs of pressure. The addition of a crimp with this load may help more consistent powder burn. Switching over to the load containing the Nosler 50-grain Ballistic Tip Varmint with 18.0 grains of Alliant Reloader 7 powder, and case overall length of 1.830”. The average velocity was 2,922 FPS. This is a max load, I did start to see some pressure signs with these loads so use caution when approaching the maximum charge weight.

With the Berger 52-grain Flat Base Varmint with 17.5 grains of Ramshot X-Terminator powder and an overall length of 1.830”, average velocities were 2,680 FPS. This was right in the mid-range between the minimum and maximum charge weights and could allow for some room for experimentation.

Swapping to the Sierra 40-grain Hornet Varminter with 13.0 grains of Ramshot Enforcer powder and an overall length of 1.825, average velocities was 2,910 FPS. Out of all the powder and bullets listed, two powders were tested per bullet. The ones listed are what I would take into the field for use in the varmint-hunting world. If I had to just pick one I would probably pick, Hornady VMAX 40 grain with Alliant Reloader 7 combo.