Recover Tactical S-PRO Review: Stock Your Glock

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With Recover Tactical’s S-PRO conversion kit, you can stock your Glock, Canik or Walther PDP.

Ever since the advent of both the handgun and the longarm, people have been searching for the best way to bridge the gap between the two. The tree created in this quest for compromise has many branches and brought us to entirely new categories (looking at you, PDW). But one of the easiest ways, and first attempts, to clasp hands was simply adding a stock to a sidearm.

This makes a lot of sense. A buttstock increases stability and allows for better recoil management by adding more points of contact with the body. It won’t make a [typically] smaller pistol round hit harder, but it’ll make the shooter more accurate while allowing for faster fire. This is why detachable stocks were seen with some 19th century calvary guns, horseback being a place where the small size and maneuverability of a handgun has advantage but the increased stability of a stock is helpful.

We see the same trend for similar reasons in the early 20th century, though often with aviation and armored vehicles in mind rather than horses. Along with assorted Mauser broomhandles, the Germans had the LP08, essentially a plussed-up Luger with tangent sights and a stock. The Browning Hi-Power, too, received a comparable “artillery” treatment. In the postwar period, the Soviets produced the similarly stocked Stechkin.

But by mid-20th century America, the stocked pistol largely disappeared. The reason for this is twofold: the American military moved toward the submachine gun and the carbine as the preferred middle path (carbines being much easier to train conscripted troops with) and the passing of the National Firearms Act of 1934. After NFA ’34 was enacted, pistols equipped with buttstocks that had barrels under 16 inches were declared short-barreled rifles—and had to be registered and have a $200 tax paid prior to legal possession.

There were outliers in the pistol/carbine conversion camp like the Dardick Model 1500 (a fascinating firearm in its own right) and truly custom pieces like the Bob Loveless S&W Model 41 convertible, but they are few and far between.

For some perspective, the NFA tax was $200 when the bill was signed in June 1934. If going by mere inflation, that $200 equates to around $4,800 in June 2025—but if we compare it to median income levels it’s the modern equivalent of $13,300. It’s no wonder that development of stocked pistols and conversions died on the vine among the American civilian market for essentially the rest of the 20th century. Now that the SBR tax has been reduced to $0, we may start to see that change.

Brace Yourself

Right around the turn of the millennium you start to see some basic carbine conversions being made in America, like the MechTech CCU, but they didn’t gain popularity until much later—the legal acceptance of pistol braces being the main reason.

Originally introduced in 2012 as a way for some disabled shooters to better stabilize so-called “large format” (read: rifle caliber) pistols, braces quickly became a legalese workaround for the more casual ownership and importation of short-barreled rifles. In the decade-plus that followed spanning several presidential administrations, the government would change their mind several times, release contrary determination letters, add and remove restrictions, follow shadowy regulations, classify braced guns as unregistered SBRs, and pass out free tax stamps—all before ultimately vacating their previous rulings. A big mess of their own making. Despite the current legal acceptance of braces on pistols at the time of writing, here we’re using a Glock receiver already registered as an SBR to avoid any gray areas.

As to why would someone need a “brace” on a regular pistol? A gun ready-made for one-handed use? While there’s a case scenario someplace because there always is, the simple answer is that a brace is really used as a buttstock—and everyone already knows that anyway. Like the glass “tobacco pipes” at the head shop, you’re just not supposed to say it out loud. Oops.

The reality is that the design of most braces make them middlin’ buttstocks at best. They’re often not adjustable, flimsy, with poor surface for purchase against the shoulder (to better defend yourself in court). That said, these aren’t universal traits, and even a bad brace/buttstock can increase stability by offering more points of contact with the body. 

Simply Israeli

When we published a Glock Stock Buyer’s Guide back in RECOIL Issue 44 back in 2019, more than half of these pistol-to-carbine conversion kits originated in Israel. And in CONCEALMENT Issue 19 we followed up with the predecessor to what you see here, the Recover Tactical 20/20 Stabilizer Kit, which also hails from there. In fact, the bulk of these conversions come out of Israel, and that’s not for no reason.

Though you’ve undoubtedly seen plenty of pictures of IDF troops slinging rifles around cities, gun ownership for citizens of Judea is quite tight. There has been some recent loosening of laws, but Tel Aviv is still nothing close to Tulsa; there are strict requirements regarding who can own guns and what type and quantity they can possess as well as how much ammo they can have on-hand.

Oftentimes people will only have one gun, and usually that one gun is a pistol. But as pistol/carbine conversion is an accessory rather than a firearm, it doesn’t require any additional paperwork for use in many jurisdictions. Israel definitely doesn’t have the American National Firearms Act so there’s no barrel length nonsense, but they will play into the brace/stabilizer aspect in order to sell on the American market.

In short, if these kind of conversion kits don’t make sense to you, it’s because they weren’t really made for you. They are made first for Israeli citizens, with the American consumer market as a secondary concern.

Recover Tactical S-PRO

Founded by Tamir Porat, the man behind the love-it-or-hate-it Tavor bullpup rifle, Recover Tactical isn’t new to either the Israeli or American market. They first caught our eye by releasing add-a-rail adapters for older pistols, something that makes more sense when viewed from the perspective of modernized a “only one gun.”

Back in 2020 they released the 20/20 Glock Stabilizer Kit, and while it’s tempting to say the S-PRO is a more-modular updated and upgraded version, it’s simply not this case because this is a whole different thing.

The real structural component of the S-PRO is the Main Frame, a metal spine with plastic carapace to which most fasteners secure and internally houses the stock/brace rod. Without this piece, there is no S-PRO. Adapters are used to hold the gun to the spine, with different adapters for different guns (at the time of writing you can get them for Glock. Canik, PDP, with the SIG X Macro listed as “coming soon,” though due to the nature of the platform the sky is the limit). The two-piece rear adapter holds the beavertail, and the front clamshell nestles around the trigger guard and clicks into place. Unlike the 2020 model, insertion and removal of the pistol is toolless and only takes seconds.

The buttstock/brace is also modular and can be configured for left- or right-handed use (with a “real” buttstock option available). Also included is a barrel shroud with M-Lok slots, which acts as a secondary locking mechanism for the front clamshell adapter, a forward spare magazine holder that prosecutors probably/hopefully/maybe won’t consider a vertical grip, and a high-rise optic mount. The reason for the high optic mount is that when your length of pull, the distance from your trigger to the end of your stock (and shoulder), is too short, low optics can be hard or impossible to use. While the LOP and angle of the stock rod on the S-PRO is actually sufficient for many to use slide-mounted optics, it was a nice inclusion.

And oh yeah, the stock rod is spring-loaded and pops out like a switchblade with the press of a button. Recover Tactical seems to have learned the lesson of Flux Defense that cool is the first rule, and spring-loaded is definitely cool.

Quirks & Weirdness On The Range

Once the gun is inside the S-PRO, physically racking the slide becomes extremely difficult. It’s for this reason that Recover Tactical includes a new clip-on charging handle. The main problem being that it was designed only with non-optic OEM Glocks in-mind, rear grooves and all. In fact, everything about the S-PRO is essentially only for OEM. The adapters rely on the critical dimensions of the rear beavertail and the front curve of the triggerguard. Aftermarket Glock frames or any modifications that change those dimensions will make the S-PRO a non-starter.

All isn’t lost, however. If you’re already running an optic on your slide, you can simply use the optic as the charging handle—and if you can’t use the optic on your gun as a charging handle, you shouldn’t be using that optic on your gun. It’s noteworthy that the high-rise optic and a slide-riding optic can both be mounted at the same time, to confuse your friends and confound your enemies if nothing else.

Here we purchased a metal Glock “racker jacker” rear plate replacement for Jackson to fill the role. It was originally ambi, but a Dremel tool took care of that quickly.

In terms of performance? A stock helps you do things faster. There’s an included cheekpiece you can bolt onto the rear for use with the high-rise optic but it didn’t really seem to be needed. The main complaint is that the stock rod has flex in it. While the main body spine may have a lot of metal in it, the stock rod feels flimsy and insufficient in actual use—it torques and twists with pressure and I don’t think I’d feel comfortable using this setup with an autosear. Damn.

Loose Rounds

The S-PRO improves on the Recover Tactical 20/20 system in many ways. It’s toolless after setup. It’s modular and able to accommodate a wider variety of arms. It allows for more accessories. It has that movie-cool switchblade stock. But the stock rod itself is a fatal flaw; hopefully they’ll add some more ounces to address it.

There are a lot of complicated clamshell carbine conversions out there. Though they’re technically convertibles, most of them should be thought of as semi-permanent because they take tools and/or time measured in minutes. This isn’t one of them, because popping a pistol inside the S-PRO only takes seconds (albeit with an asterisk attached, depending on your setup). This ease of conversion means you’re more likely to actually use it at home or on the range, which makes a lot of sense for a nation where if you own a gun, it’s probably just the one.

Recover Tactical S-PRO

• Fits: Glock, Walther PDP, Canik – more soon
• URL: recovertactical.com
• MSRP: $300

Editor's Note: This article originally appeared in the April 2026 issue of Gun Digest the Magazine.

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