Rifle Scopes New kahles 525
- Thread starter Iggles2017
- Start date
I just got a chance to play with the k318 and k525 at the K&M/Kahles precision rifle challenge. It looked very nice. I will say that I only was holding it and looking through it. It was not mounted on a rifle and I didn't shoot behind it. Ive always like the skmr reticles and their floating dot. I really liked the magnification ring stiffness and the tactile feel of the elevation clicks. the spinner on the windage knob was cool as well. I can't wait to get mine and put it through its paces on my rifle.
Nice to hear one has finally made an appearance, was Kahles just showing it off or did they indicate any kind of time frame?
well, they were showing it off for sure! Like I said, i really liked it. I believe they mentioned aug delivery. shouldn't be too long now. I think the problem will be if you don't already have one ordered, it may be a while. the demand has been high from what I understand.
I look forward to seeing a competent review between the K624i and K525i differences. Sure we know the K525i has a 5x erector with slightly better FOV and is shorter with a few tweaks to the turrets, but I think the biggest question on everyone's mind is how much they improved the scope optically. Was Kahles able to squeeze better optical performance out of the new 5x design than they were the original 4x and still maintain the fantastic eyebox they are well known for. I am watching this one closely as I loved the K624i but felt it could have been improved upon optically.
well, when I get my k525, i will compare it to my k624. both will have the skmr 1 reticle, so that will be equal. the thing that I am most interested in is the new erector design. my k624 has never had tracking issues, but I know some of them have. so that will be interesting to see how the k525 holds up after a bunch are out. honestly, I am not that sensitive to CA and ive never really noticed any in my k624 even compared to my Schmidt. but I will try and really look at that back to back between the k624 and k525 on the same day at the same targets
As pleased as I've been with all the K624i scopes I've owned, I'm a little conflicted in regards to the K525 - am considering buying another K624i or two if distributors discount them significantly when the K525s are released. Sure, I'd love to get my hands on one of the newer models, but have to wonder if there will be enough improvement to make them worth the price difference. I've never seen enough CA in any of the six K624is I've owned to bother me, they all tracked perfectly, I still like the AMR reticle, and the click/detents of the older Gen 2 & 3 scopes' knobs are as close to perfect as I've yet experienced.
The glass quality is noticeably better on the K318 compared to the K624. Itll only be better on the K525. There is more of that Kahles "pop" and CA is controlled better.
Everyone's eyes are different, but this is my thoughts on CA. I never saw CA until I looked through scopes that did not have it or controlled it better. I ran a T5Xi for a long time and thought the glass was great for the price until I looked through higher tier scopes, until that point I did not notice the CA. Best way I can think to describe it is you dont know that the color red, isnt really red, until you see the real red. Like you dont know CA exists because you havnt seen anything without it, if that makes sense.
I cant tell you how many K624's I have looked through recently, and they all exhibit CA. I will say that the CA in the K624 is highly dependent on eye placement behind the scope.
I've seen lots of CA shooting behind my Bushnell 3.5-21x50 ERS, and quite a bit in the two Weaver 6-30x56s I bought when Midway was running a clearance on them. I've never seen nearly as much through any of the Kahles scopes I've owned, nor do the Athlon Cronus 4.5-29x56s have enough to bother me. At 66yrs of age, my eyes aren't nearly as sharp as they once were, and that could be part of the reason for my lack of awareness of CA in the Kahles - but I can see it w/o specifically looking for it in the Bushy & Weavers, so it's not like I'm totally blind to the effect. Whatever - it's never bothered me while shooting with the Kahles, and if buying a K525 would spoil me for enjoying my K624i scopes, then why the heck would I do that?
I also dnt care or not even notcing CA that much.. i got one k25 in skmr3 on order..i might do another pre order to replace on of my sb 5-25 gen2xr..the k25 being little shorter than sb5-25 makes rifle look balance..(yes i said looks) for 26" or shorter barrel..who doesnt like a sexy rifle 
I think that's what a lot of K624i owners are curious about, is the K525i enough to upgrade or possibly hold out for some great clearance sales on the K624i.
This is my biggest gripe, I dumped my kahles awhile ago after immmediately seeing horrible CA in comparison to Schmidt nightforce, and minox. It bugged me Bc a scope that retails for $2999 should have better optical quality. And the thing that pissed me off, and make me sell it, was kahles took a high nosed stance on it.
I’m happy that the new 5-25 is better and I’ll be looking forward to checking one out.
Not many manufacturer's will admit the deficiencies in their design/product, why would they/should they. In the case of CA with Kahles they never really addressed it and I doubt it hurt their sales much as I believe they were the #2 scope used on the PRS circuit last year. It will be interesting to see the results of the polls in 2019 with ZCO, Kahles and maybe even the new Steiner 4-28x56 getting some interest. If Kahles has improved upon CA with their K525i I can only see their popularity growing, I only see the ZCO ZC527 really hindering sales of the K525i if it's all it's hyped up to be, the nice thing about the Kahles is the standard 34mm rings, though a good set of 36mm rings should come in under $200 so may not be that big of a deal.
When you charge $3000 for a nothing special scope while claiming 100+years of experience in scope making, your scope should not have any CA. It should be perfect and not have to go through three redesigns in three years.
The 5-25 better be awesome for what they’re charging.
The 5-25 better be awesome for what they’re charging.
It’s high time we started to recognise these PRS polls for what they are - increasingly a survey of who sponsors the PRS. There is a lack of intellectual honesty in the results.
you say that, but there is a lot less "sponsorship" than you think. there are only a couple of teams/individuals who are fully optic sponsored. And most of them got the sponsorship because that's what they wanted to shoot. I don't see a lot of people switching optics because of another sponsor coming up and offering them a better deal. And even if they are sponsored, it does still show what you can do with that optic. not saying those shooters wouldn't do well with another optic, but when people blast one optic or another and a guy/gal is winning with it (regardless of sponsorship or not) it obviously works.
Man, any of the top optics will "obviously work" (USO, Nightforce, Vortex, S&B, TT, Kahles, Steiner, Bushnell, Henny, Leupold). The point he is making, and I think it is valid, is that certain scope makers have a lot of presence at these events, Kahles and Bushnell immediately come to mind. I do not know who gets what at a discount or is sponsored to use this scope, nor do I care. Choose your flavor of choice and rock it.
If no one calls out these companies for deficiencies, or at least keeps them honest, products would not continue to improve as quickly as they have been. I am happy to see the new line of Kahles scopes. I have been overwhelmingly impressed with the K318, and will purchase a k525.
I'm not sure about intellectual honestly, the poll simply identifies what scope someone used, now I agree, another question that should be asked with the poll should be something like, "did you purchase the scope with your own money" or "was the scope provided to you free of charge?". That being said, if the poll is done with only the top 100 shooters or close then one could also assume those top shooters may be sponsored in some form or another, but does that sponsorship mean they get a free scope from the manufacturer - maybe, maybe not; for sure the manufacturer knows the benefit of free advertising, maybe Nike gives free shoes to Michael Jordan but they know they'll sell a lot more than that; however, giving away a $200 pair of shoes is a bit different from giving away a $2500 scope and the top PRS shooters may not have quite the name recognition that a top televised sports athlete would. It would be interesting to find out how many scopes are provided free of charge and to how many shooters, but how would one even go about finding that out because the shooter may be under an NDA to not disclose what has been "given" to them. Regardless, mpk makes a good point, even if a scope is provided it still shows the scope is more than functional if the shooter is able to win comps with it as I find it hard to believe that if a scope was a piece of junk then the shooter may not even be in the top 100.
Welcome to the club ha. Buddy of mine sponsored by Kahles says he might have his in July. Hoping i get to see it. I hope they release earlier than August.
There are already a couple prototypes in the wild and I would not be surprised to see people affiliated with Kahles get their's prior to the release.
Everyone I have talked to, and the Kahles USA website, all say August/September. I am not holding my breath for anything earlier, but it would be nice.
After looking through a couple more K318's my decision was made. I almost pulled the trigger on a K318 but decided to wait for the K525.
After the Kahles I bought got humbled on the humbler and reading about other people having the same issues it would have to be a long time with a lot of good reviews before I took the plunge on Kahles again.
Which Kahles are you talking about? The K624i? It has a great track record of tracking well. While it's possible there are a few that slipped by QC I would have to say this is the exception rather than the rule, the big test is how does it perform in the field. I am not doubting KSE's results, but there are so many variables at play, a tall target test and more importantly real world results at distance would weigh more in a true determination of turret consistency. That being said, I've been burned by being an early adopter before, there are risks but some rewards as well.
The one I sent to KSE was a k312i. I wanted a more compact, generous FOV scope for a semiauto application.
It only tracked to 7 mils or so and according to KSE that was pretty typical of other Kahles scopes he had tested (I had seen a k624i do the same thing early in the thread) and did some funny things when you adjusted the parallax. The vendor I bought it from was good about the whole thing and gave me a full refund and then some.
I suspect a lot of people that don't box test their scopes or dial a lot of elevation probably just never even realize there is an issue and it was, in fact, very widespread.
It only tracked to 7 mils or so and according to KSE that was pretty typical of other Kahles scopes he had tested (I had seen a k624i do the same thing early in the thread) and did some funny things when you adjusted the parallax. The vendor I bought it from was good about the whole thing and gave me a full refund and then some.
I suspect a lot of people that don't box test their scopes or dial a lot of elevation probably just never even realize there is an issue and it was, in fact, very widespread.
^^^ Thanks Falar, it will be interesting to see how the new 5x series does, one would hope that Kahles would improve upon the previous design in every way. So far the K318i owners seem to be very happy, I am guessing we'll see a lot more K525i adopters on this forum once those finally hit the shelves...
To be fair i'd say the vast majority don't put their scopes on a jig and test tracking. Especially past the $2000 range. Which admittedly past that price point i expect the tracking to be solid. Though there are countless examples of scopes past that price point that don't. Errors do happen even among the most expensive optics. Even having said that there are crap ton 624i in use. Their failure rate evidently isn't that high, least the Gen III. That or the SKMR3 supersedes the minor hiccups here and there.
I'd give them another chance with the new series if the reviews pan out in your case. I'm obviously on board. I ended up being an early adopter of the MK5 despite having been burned on a MK6 and honestly there are no regrets. That optic was awesome and if i was independently wealthy i'd have never let it go.
We are taking Pre-Orders on the Kahles K525i, please call 916-670-1103 and we will set you up
What's the retail price going to be?We are taking Pre-Orders on the Kahles K525i, please call 916-670-1103 and we will set you up
Pretty excited to get mine, i pre ordered today as well, my buddies shoot a K624i and S&B 3-20 pmii so it'll be nice to compare the 3 together.
Gotta wait until it comes out for that type of comparison. For now, use the 624i as your comparison, since the 525 will be its replacement
Not to derail this thread any, but I built my own version of the humbler out of 40 lbs of steel and a picatinny rail. I have tested quite a few scopes including a gen 3 Kahles 624i. My test target goes to 15 mils and the Kahles was less than 0.1 mil off at 15 mils. I test every scope I use. I am also a dealer and I will let anyone use my test stand to test scopes they have or purchase. I agree that many people do not test their scopes.
I'd be curious to hear about this as well
Like mij already mentioned, the K525i hasn't even hit the shelves yet; however, here is a spec comparison with a few others thrown in:
The new Kahles K525i is 1.5" shorter than the Minox, it does have Twist Guard which helps against accidental adjustment of the windage whereas the Minox doesn't have any locking mechanism, it's parallax can go down to 22y vs 50m, the Minox does have a wee bit of an advantage in FOV but everything else is pretty comparable.
Edit: fixed elevation to windage for Twist Guard
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Cool comparison, thanks. Is the Twist Guard on the elevation turret as well as windage? I thought it was just windage.
Minox doesn't need locking turrets; those turrets aren't moving if you don't mean for them to.
Oh oops, I meant to write windage, it's only on windage, good catch
I've never had either elevation or windage knobs on any of the several Kahles K624i scopes I've owned/still own move accidentally. Have pulled them out of several different drag bags & other soft cases, and neither the Gen II's smooth knobs nor Gen III's scalloped knobs have ever caught on anything & turned. It's my opinion that Kahles hit the perfect combination of click detents on their scopes - it's always been simple, easy, & consistent to get one click when one click was all I wanted on these scopes, and that's more than I can say for any of several other top-end scopes I've handled.
It looks like Mile High has some MOA in stock, hopefully some SKMR3's show up soon.
https://www.milehighshooting.com/kahles-10645-k-525i-5-25x56-ccw-moak-w-left-windage/
https://www.milehighshooting.com/kahles-10645-k-525i-5-25x56-ccw-moak-w-left-windage/
Well well....looks like kahles did it again.always on time or ealier from expected date
it means mil/mil just couple blocks behind Well well....looks like kahles did it again.always on time or ealier from expected date
That's what we are hoping
I`ve looked through the k525i on a competition last weekend, can't say it had better optics compared to the k624i(didn't have one near to compare), but it had less CA(looked at patches of snow at different distances), didn't notice it much in the center but got slightly worse closer to the edges. Might be a different story with the released scopes tho. Also noticed that the elevation turret was larger, which feelt great.
Had some luck with the draw on the prize table, so i'm waiting for one now.
Probably have it by early august, can compare it with a k624i gen3 and some other high end scopes and write a small review once it sits on my rifle.
Had some luck with the draw on the prize table, so i'm waiting for one now.
Probably have it by early august, can compare it with a k624i gen3 and some other high end scopes and write a small review once it sits on my rifle.
CA on 624i dont really bother me much..im already expecting that from 5-25 but being little more compact is what im likingI`ve looked through the k525i on a competition last weekend, can't say it had better optics compared to the k624i(didn't have one near to compare), but it had less CA(looked at patches of snow at different distances), didn't notice it much in the center but got slightly worse closer to the edges. Might be a different story with the released scopes tho. Also noticed that the elevation turret was larger, which feelt great.
Had some luck with the draw on the prize table, so i'm waiting for one now.
Probably have it by early august, can compare it with a k624i gen3 and some other high end scopes and write a small review once it sits on my rifle.
I`ve looked through the k525i on a competition last weekend, can't say it had better optics compared to the k624i(didn't have one near to compare), but it had less CA(looked at patches of snow at different distances), didn't notice it much in the center but got slightly worse closer to the edges. Might be a different story with the released scopes tho. Also noticed that the elevation turret was larger, which feelt great.
Had some luck with the draw on the prize table, so i'm waiting for one now.
Probably have it by early august, can compare it with a k624i gen3 and some other high end scopes and write a small review once it sits on my rifle.
Which reticle was on the scope you looked through? Curious because the MOAK seem to be starting to appear but not the SKMRs yet.
SKMR3 or SKMR, little sleep, a long match and a few beers after that so can't remember which one it was.
The guy who had it was from Kahles.
The guy who had it was from Kahles.
Big shout out to @CSTactical thanks to you it's christmas in July
I'll let everyone know my impressions in about 1.5-2 weeks time Big shout out to @CSTactical thanks to you it's christmas in July
You're extremely welcome! I can't wait for some big shipments to come in
