Kahles K16i 1-6x24

[JoshNC]

Hey fellas,

Chris here form SportOptics.

Just wanted to chime in on the Kahles Rifle Scopes, in particular the Kahles 1-6x24 and what myself and our customers have experienced.

The scope is fantastic. Extremely wide FOV. Very easy scope to get behind. It is weighted very well. Not obnoxiously heavy like others 1-6's i've handled.

Glass is outstanding. Crystal clear with true color rendition, great resolution and contrast properties. No fish eye effect is evident on lower powers. Eye relief is constant through out the power range. Sight picture is nice and flat. Target acquisition is very fast in my experiences with the scope.

Reticles come based in either Mil or Moa. They have a velocity based reticle for those that like a BDC style reticle.

Illumination is daytime bright allowing the shooter to use the instrument like a red dot when set on 1x. The illumination control is an external rheostat adjustment.

I'm going to predict that it's going to be "the" three gun scope this season especially with Daniel Horner and Katie Harris dropping their S&B's and running the Kahles.

If you guys have anymore questions feel free to contact us.

Chris, thanks for the info. It sounds great. I will be calling you guys this week. What is your preferred reticle?

[chris@so]

Chris, thanks for the info. It sounds great. I will be calling you guys this week. What is your preferred reticle?

I prefer SM1 and SM2 with SM2 being my personal favorite. For me it's a quicker reticle to deploy.

However we sell a lot of SM2's because it's based off of Nightforce's FC2 reticle.

Josh make sure you mention our conversation and I'll take care of you.

Does Kahles offer a Mil/LE sales discount like Leupold and Swarovski?

Not sure. If not, we work with mil/le individuals and agencies all the time.

[Tuukka]

Got the K16i scope on Friday and went to the range today.



To give you a little bit of background where my comments are coming from, I have been on the Finnish Open class national Practical rifle team since 2009, alternate member for this season.

This first range trip was just zeroing and just feeling out the scope on the range for the first time. Shooting drills and speed more oriented to the sport will follow later this week.

This particular scope has the G4B reticle, which in my opinion is the best of the available options for Practical / 3-gun shooting.




The reticle and the dot are in the second focal plane. The dot size is very small ( 2cm at 100 meters / 6x zoom )

Therefore the dot does not cover for example a 20 cm / 8 inch plate at 300 meters.

The optical quality, clarity and brightness are excellent, however I am no optician

The extension lever on the magnification is ok, but I might modify it to be longer.

The adjustments are 1/2 MOA at 100 meters.



As mentioned, I did not really focus on shooting speed this time, but this was produced at 100 meters by pulling the trigger as soon as the dot settled in from recoil:



At 300 meters I was checking the dope as I had not shot this particular load at that distance, but this is what the first 5 shot group looked like:



Overall the scope left me with a really good first impression, the only thing I can quickly think that I would like to see is a locking BDC turret.

As I have been competing with a S&B Short Dot LE for the past few seasons, really easy to adjust the turret and to check the zero with one glance. However this is a very small gripe.

[MadAngler1]

Thanks for the review Tuukka!

So you're still running an Aimpoint on the side of your 1-6x scope? Is there a technical reason for this or do you feel that the 1x setting is not good enough on the scope? I'm guessing you have an Aimpoint there for speed on certain courses.

How's the eye box compared to your Short Dot?

[Tuukka]

Thanks for the review Tuukka!

So you're still running an Aimpoint on the side of your 1-6x scope? Is there a technical reason for this or do you feel that the 1x setting is not good enough on the scope? I'm guessing you have an Aimpoint there for speed on certain courses.

How's the eye box compared to your Short Dot?

I will compare the scopes at work today.

The T1 is there for stages that the scope needs to be on 6x for upcoming targets and you have targets close in before getting to the further targets. This usually in cases that you are engaging a close in target set and right away you have targets further out.

So you do not have to switch around with the magnification and losing seconds doing that.

[e0603]

In case anyone's curious, I dug up the reticle specifications: G4B, SI1, SM1, SM2

I'm definitely intrigued by this scope and look forward to hearing more about it.

[JoshNC]

Thanks Tuuka for your review. Great info. Looks like a nice combo in the Spuhr mount. Thanks e0603 for the links to the reticle subtentions.

I still havent pulled the trigger on an optic for my inbound ECC due to massive perseveration on my part. I am down to the k16i with SM1 or SM2, Leupy mk6 1-6x with CMR-W, or Leupy Mk8 CQBSS with H27. I must say that I am leaning toward the CQBSS due to the Horus reticle. The k16i is very interesting to me, but I like the idea of the h27 and FFP of the CQBSS.

[MadAngler1]

Thanks Tuuka for your review. Great info. Looks like a nice combo in the Spuhr mount. Thanks e0603 for the links to the reticle subtentions.

I still havent pulled the trigger on an optic for my inbound ECC due to massive perseveration on my part. I am down to the k16i with SM1 or SM2, Leupy mk6 1-6x with CMR-W, or Leupy Mk8 CQBSS with H27. I must say that I am leaning toward the CQBSS due to the Horus reticle. The k16i is very interesting to me, but I like the idea of the h27 and FFP of the CQBSS.

I'm in the same boat as you, except I have a SCAR-H.

How useful is a Horus reticule on a 8x or 6x scope though? For me, it comes down to the Kahles vs. S&B short dot vs. Mark 6. I've only had some trigger time behind the short dot; I'm going to have to purchase a Mark 6 or Kahles and mail it back (unmounted) to compare/contrast I guess.

[Tuukka]

Just shot the Danish Open rifle match in Copenhagen, made a couple of mistakes and that cost me the medal this time and dropped to 5th.

The match overall had 13 stages from 5 meters out to 300 meters, with the 300 m stage having targets between those distances.

I did utilize the T1 on certain stages and shooting positions where the scope had to be on higher magnification to immediately engage further targets.

I am very confident in this scope overall and believe it is an excellent choice for a variable scope for competition use.

[BigJoe]

I talked with Ken from kahles USA a couple days ago they have been working on setting up a MIL/LEO discount they are not quite there yet. He is a really great guy to talk to, i should have the 1-6 and 6-24 in hand when i get back from downrange to try out. I have heard nothing but great things from buddies in the tactical long range competition circuit. with S&B increasing prices and making scopes i'm not a huge fan of kahles is making big waves in that price range.