Excelitas Kite Mk. 4

The Kite Mk4 night vision CWS scope is 4x magnification night vision device with sight reticle that can be turned ON/OFF. It is intended as use as a weapon mounted scope but can also function as a handheld viewer.

Origninally produced by British company Pilkington (now Excelitas and previously Qioptiq) it is a part of the Common Weapon Sight suite together with its considerably larger sibling Maxi.

While an uncommon sight in the civilian second hand market some of these devices are available by such contexts. They have been in use with UK Armed Forces and there are anectodal accounts of British officers being required to have one as part of their equipment for certain missions and postings while the Armed Forces themselves did not issue the devices. The affected officers had to privately purchase civilian spec units at full market prices and it can be speculated that such an investment was either sold on to colleagues or held on to after the posting had ended.

Design and function

The Kite Mk4 is a fairly lightweight considering its imposing size and usually comes with a mounted British military weapons attachment rail mounting base. It features a 4x optical magnification assembly installed ahead of the tube and a self closing rubber eyecup at the eyepiece with a tab that folds out of the way when the user slightly pushes up against the eyecup with their face.

The power source unit is located on the rear half of the housing and has positive detent screws for zeroing (windage and elevation), an off/on/sight-on 3-pole switch and a stepless potentiometer to set the brightness of the projected yellow chevron reticle. The device runs on two 1.5V AA batteries that are inserted facing the same direction (positive pole facing up) and held secure by a screw-down weather-proof lid equipped with a o-ring seal.

Designed to function with 3rd gen IIT it was available on both military and civilian markets, where the latter was equipped with slightly less impressive tubes than were those delivered to armed forces.

The civilian market version came accessorized with a rainproof carry pouch and a self-retaining rubber lens cover that doubles as daycap with a dial operated filter with two settings: cloudy/indoor and sunshine to facilitate use in a variety of lighting conditions.

It remains (as of August 2022) in Excelitas current range of available defense products as part of the CWS suite under the name of Kite, part of their product lines intended for dismounted infantry.

Serviceability

Since the devices function hinges on a delicate interplay between optical magnification and image intensifier tube it is not considered end-user serviceable. Excelitas indicates that any damages or parts replacement has to be done by a certified technician since the procedure requires specialized proprietary tools. The specific nature of these tools remains currently obscure.

Handheld use

The Kite Mk.4 is a powerful night vision scope and functions well as handheld night vision device for most applications. The weapons rail-attachment interface is easily removable by the end user thereby making the device less awkward to use with one hand. As well as lacking any mount or bridge attachment options the 4x magnification makes "hands free" (i.e. helmet mounted) use of the device impractical.

Weapons mounted use

Older Kite units come equipped with a UK Armed Forces standard rail attachment mount that differs entirely from the more widely used Mil-Std-1913 "weaver"/"picatinny" system. UK Ministry of Defence began a project called FIST in 2011 where an update of the hanguard of the L85 (also known as SA80) standard rifle was introduced introduced picatinny rails to accomodate the adoption of the Elcan SpectreOS x4 daysight and subsequently Qioptiq changed their CWS system to function with the update. However these upgraded rail attachment mounts for Kite Mk.4 units have not been available on the civilian market and will, in all probability, never be in the future as the CWS is not marketed towards civilians. This leaves any current owners of the older iterations who do not possess the now abandoned former military standard rail forced to customize their units in whatever way available to the individual for use as a weapons sight.