Smith and Wesson SW22 Victory Tandemkross Build

 

Back in 2013, Ruger introduced their new 22/45 Lite. It was a lighter weight version of their very popular 22lr pistol which was a derivative of the ubiquitous Ruger mark three. The pistol came with a light weight upper receiver in a very cool anodized blue color and the steel pencil barrel was inserted into the upper under tension which kept the weight down and accuracy up. I saw this pistol for the first time and I knew right away it was one I had to have. After buying one in 2014 it lived up to the hype.  In its stock iteration the 22/45 Lite was a dream to shoot; but like most of my guns, I couldn't leave it stock long.  I ended up buying every part Tandemkross and Volquartsen made for the 22/45 and turned the great gun. . . . well, greater.  My wife called it my "Ray-gun", which based on its wild appearance it actually was a fairly appropriate moniker.  I owned the 22/45 lite for many years and it was an amazing gun, but one thing you'll learn if you buy a Ruger 22/45 or Mk3 is they can be rather complex to work on. In fact if you own or have worked on a 22/45, you'll learn it can be a bit of a chore just to take it down to clean it. 

More recently, I built a custom 22/45 clone and while it is not rocket science, it does get a bit tricky.  All of this to say, when I bought a Smith and Wesson SW22 Victory with the intention of fully customizing it, I fully expected to have a similar experience while working on it.  This was NOT the case.  One of the best parts of the Victory pistol is it is very simple to work on. 

 

I worked closely with Tandemkross on this project and decided it wanted to utilize every part they offered for the Victory.  While I don't intend to outline every step of the build process here I will give the highlights and tell you to go check out my YouTube video for an in depth "How-To".  

After checking to make sure it is safe and clear, a single bolt removes the upper from the lower.

Once the upper is removed from the lower the bolt slides right out of the upper.

I replaced the recoil spring and Guide rod with Tandemkross' stainless steel part. It literally just lifts out and you can insert the new one without any special tools. 

A single bolt holds the barrel onto the upper and the barrel slides out with very little effort.  The new barrel slides directly into the upper and is secured just as easily.  

The grip panels are secured with two bolts on each side and after removing the grip panels you gain access to all of the lower/internal parts. 

One pin secures the hammer and sear and safety etc. and the trickiest part of the entire process is; the safety has a hooded portion and you need to hook the hooked portion over the sear.  This means you push the sear down (under spring tension) and set the safety lever right over the sear and then keep pressure down on the safety lever while you insert the hammer and pin. Holding down on the safety/sear while inserting the hammer and lining up the parts to insert the pin can be just a tad tricky.

Also, I found it best to start the pre and post travel screws in the trigger prior to installing it in the frame.

After installing all the new internal parts, the new Hive grips lock everything in.

Another trick which I found helpful; this part (large nut which threads into the bottom of the barrel) was still in the lower frame after I had removed the upper from the lower, but since the new Tandemkross barrel had this part already installed, I needed a way to remove the Allen head bolt from the larger barrel bolt. I ended up placing the barrel on the lower and threading the large bolt into the barrel, and then applied tension to the barrel which allowed me to remove the Allen head and the larger bolt.

Putting the upper and lower back together was super easy and I moved on to adjusting the pre and post travel screws.

Last part of the upgrade process was adding the Tandemkross magazine bumper pads.  The design of these really makes the install quite easy because it can only be installed correctly. 

The pistol in its stock form is really a wonderful design and a very nice shooter. But now it is a next level race gun and I am so stoked with how it turned out.  Go check out my YouTube video as it goes into much greater detail than this Blog post.

YouTube/Faithkillsfear 

To find all of the Tandemkross parts, use the following link;

Tandemkross.com

You can also find many of the parts at Brownells through the following link;

Brownells.com

Check out all the other links via my Linktree;

https://linktr.ee/faithkillsfear