And one of the things that always comes up is that the Remington Fireball brass isn't the best for longevity? Factory Remington brass, maybe 20 to 25 firings, primer pockets still snug and no issues. I'll admit I mid range load so my brass never gets hammered. Maybe throw in an anneal to keep the brass movable.
What I did when I got into the 20 VT was reform my fired fireball brass to 20 VT. That showed me where the neck size made a difference. Fired/reformed brass was all over the place. New formed to the VT was pretty even. Turned out to be a lot of work till I got my reamer with a .034 neck. That took everything with less issues. Never was really impressed with the VT so I sold the reamer, dies and barrels.
What I started out looking for was a loadable centerfire round that when fired, I could still see my target hits @ 100 yards. Got real close but still just enough movement to blur your sight and this was even with a 16+ lb. bench rifle.
With a pistol. a waste of time. Deadly accurate but not exactly what I was looking for. Anything out past 100 yards, the rig had a chance to settle down and you could see the hits. Finally settled on my 20 MGM Wildcat. (necked down to 20 TCM case and the bullet seated to the shoulder/neck junction) Nice factory brass and just @ 10 grains of powder!! Zero freebore and bullets seated .010 into the lands.
The .221 Remington Fireball is STILL my favorite. Started off with a Remington XP 100 pistol, way back when. Hitting steel out to and past 400 yards with a 10" bolt action pistol will put a smile on ANYBODY'S face!!
I remember way back, a Grandpa and his Grandson showed up at the range. The kid, maybe 13 or 14 years old and me shooting my XP 100. The kid was watching me close so I asked Grandpa if he could shoot the pistol.
Grandpa said yes so I set the kid up and showed him how to sight thru the LER scope and warned him about the "Hair Trigger".
When the XP went BANG and we heard the "ting" on the 400 yard steel target, the kid had a grin om his face that I bet he still has.
My bet is that to this day, the kid probably has his OWN XP pistol.

It's the simple things in life.

A little late in life but I would love to build another XP Pistol and chamber it in my 20 MGM Wildcat. Single feeds as smooth as silk. I tried so I know it would work reliably. Probably go with a 20" straight pipe in a pistol stock. So far, hasn't cost me anything to dream.
