Disclosure: TandemKross provided these products for testing and evaluation. TandemKross did not see the video before it was published. This is an install walkthrough plus a first range session (~11 min video), not a long-term durability test.
Hey Squat Squad — today we’re looking at five accessories that make your Taurus TX22 more functional, more reliable, and just plain old cool. All five come from TandemKross. I’ll go through them one by one, put them all on the gun, and then we head to the range to see what actually works. Spoiler: four of them stayed on the gun, one came off.
TX22 fiber optic front sight: slav.li/TKTX22FiberOptic. Eagle’s Talon extractor for the TX22: TandemKross Eagle’s Talon. More gear I use: SlavGuns Amazon.
Why the TX22 gets so much aftermarket love
The Taurus TX22 has become one of the most popular and best-selling .22 rimfire handguns of the past few years. It’s the first handgun that really brought the .22 LR cartridge into what is more or less a full-size polymer pistol — which makes it a legit training tool for a centerfire gun. Nothing wrong with something like the Smith & Wesson Victory or the Ruger Mark IV, but those are more target pistols than a traditional polymer handgun. Because the TX22 sells so well, a bunch of companies started making accessories for it. These are the five I think make the biggest difference.
1. Fiber optic front sight
The TX22 ships with standard three-dot sights. Nothing wrong with them, but they’re not ideal for quick target acquisition or transitions. The TandemKross fiber optic front sight collects a lot more light than a plain black blade or a white dot, so it’s easier to catch the front sight in all kinds of lighting. Install is easy, and it’s also compatible with the Taurus G2, G2C, and G3 pistols.
2. +5 magazine extensions
One of the TX22’s big selling points is the 16-round standard magazine — way ahead of most rimfire pistols that run 10 rounds, including the Glock 44. The TandemKross +5 base plates come in a two-pack and include new magazine springs to handle the extra capacity and length. On paper that’s 16+5; at the range I actually got 22 rounds in. Obviously pointless if you live in a state with magazine restrictions, but as fun as .22s are, extra capacity is simply awesome.
The one downside I found: the factory mag normally lets you pull the follower down with the little button, and with the extension installed you lose that. So you’re loading the traditional way — or grabbing a mag loader to save your thumbs.
3. Eagle’s Talon extractor
This one is tiny and it won’t make the gun prettier, but it’s the reliability upgrade. Extractors on .22s tend to wear out over time, and since .22s are what you shoot the most, you’re far more likely to see that problem here than on a 6.5 Creedmoor or .338 Lapua bolt gun. The Eagle’s Talon is a replacement extractor made from hardened tool steel, EDM machined and ground. The idea is longer life and pushing off the usual bad-extractor problems like stovepipes and failures to extract. And if you do somehow wear it out, TandemKross guarantees it for life. Heads up: of the five parts, this was the one install that was a bit of a pain in the butt.
4. Challenger charging handle
The Challenger replaces the factory backer plate with an aluminum charging handle to keep the weight down. Is it necessary? Absolutely not. But it’s really nice for two groups of people:
- Anyone with hand issues like arthritis, or anyone who struggles to rack a slide — it’s a lot easier to grab this than the top of the slide.
- New shooters. The TX22 is usually the first handgun I start new gun owners on. One of the skills you have to teach is racking the slide to clear a malfunction or pull a round out of the chamber, and I’ve seen plenty of new shooters cover the muzzle or the ejection port while doing it. A big handle on the back gives them more confidence and gives you more sanity.
At the range it definitely made the gun easier to manipulate. I really like this “grippy thingy” for younger and newer shooters.
5. Game Changer Pro compensator
Because, well, why not? .22s aren’t known for recoil, but there’s still enough gas to drive a comp. The Game Changer Pro is TandemKross’s steel .22 compensator. It adds weight up front to balance the gun and help the sights settle back on target, and the ports vent gas at 45 degrees to help visibility of the sight and target — especially with dirty exposed-lead bullets. It’s threaded 1/2×28 and comes with a rubber O-ring, so TandemKross says it can be used on other guns and calibers too, including .22 WMR, .17 HMR, and even .223/5.56.
Range day: what worked and what didn’t
Installing everything was straightforward — sight, handle, and mag extensions were easy; the extractor was the only one that took some fiddling. Then we went shooting.
The magazines with extensions were great, the charging handle made manipulation easier, and the fiber optic did its job. Then I started having an issue with the gun failing to go fully into battery — I got light primer strikes and a click. At first I thought it might be the extractor, but by the end it really looked like the compensator was adding too much weight to the slide (maybe combined with the ammo). I took the comp off and the gun ran perfectly again.
The comp may slightly reduce recoil, but it absolutely slows the slide down, and on my gun that was causing the lockup problems. You definitely don’t need a comp on a .22, and as we saw, it hurt reliability.
Bottom line
The “TandemKrossized” TX22 is a better gun with four of these five mods: the fiber optic front sight, the +5 magazine extensions, the Eagle’s Talon extractor, and the Challenger charging handle — especially if you’re teaching new shooters. The compensator is the one I’d skip on this pistol; it caused failures to go into battery on my gun until I pulled it off. Note that this video is from a while back and a couple of the original product links from the description no longer resolve, so check TandemKross’s current TX22 lineup before you order.
Fiber optic front sight: slav.li/TKTX22FiberOptic. Eagle’s Talon extractor: TandemKross Eagle’s Talon. More gear: slav.li/amazon. Squat Squad perks: join the channel.
Keep squatting.
Have you run a comp on a .22 pistol — did it help, or did it choke the slide like mine?
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