So I seem to be having phenomenal success with RIT dye on the keys and Duplicolor Vinyl and Fabric spray paint on the frames (and space bars). Here's how I do it: (reposted from my entries on the RIT Dye wiki)
ORIGINAL: Alright, ladies and gents... I pulled the trigger. I took my Compaq 11800 and did a paint and dye job. I'm not completely done (local store didn't have one of the colors I was hoping to have), but it's very close.
Originally, this was a standard beige keyboard... fairly light, actually.
The keys took the dye REALLY well. My method: First, I cleaned the keys (which are all PBT) in a pot, covering them in 91% isopropyl alcohol, stirring with the chopsticks. I rinsed them with tap water and shook the excess water off before I started the rest. I wanted to make sure I got all the oils off before dying them. After that, start a pot (about 2 cups) of water on the stove, throw 1.5 cups water into the microwave for 3.5 min (bubbling), drop the dye into the microwaved water, mix with chopsticks to disolve, pour into hot (not boiling, but steaming) water in the pot, immediately dump keys in (NOTICE: I DID NOT USE ANY SALT IN MY SETS AT ALL). I set the timer on the microwave for 15 minutes, checking the color ever 15 seconds or so. The green took the color in 2.25 minutes! It got to the exact color I wanted... any more time and it would have been too dark. The brown took about 2.5 minutes to reach the desired chocolatey color. I used the chopsticks to check the color and to stir CONSTANTLY. Since I already knew they were where I wanted them (I was taking one out and dropping it in cold water every 15 seconds, after all), I just dumped the dye and all into a collander and rinsed them with cold tap water, stirring with the chopsticks, then with my hands to make sure to get all the dye off and stop the staining process. I like they way they turned out.
So I painted the space bar (it's ABS) and the case (also ABS) with DupliColor Fabric and Vinyl paint, which I got from an earlier post (thanks!). It soaks right into the plastic, so the overspray isn't a problem at all. I used Desert Sand for the case and Flat Black for the space, tenkey 0, tenkey enter and tenkey plus as well as the mouse buttons.
EDIT: I added these pictures and removed the others. I was finally able to get a decently close color match. The frame proved difficult, but that white sheet of paper helped me nail it down. The browns are very chocolatey, which may or may not come across here. /Edit.
The only thing I want to do now is the Esc, Insert (I type Dvorak, so CTRL-Insert/ Shift-Insert are my preferred copy-paste combo) and Pause/Break (I wanted a third key and it's spaced out enough to fit my need) keys in some vibrant shade... I was thinking either red (kinda standard, right?) or orange. I may even forgo the bright orange and go for a more burnt umber-type color. I'll mock it up in Gimp and see. So what do you think? I like the way it turned out. (for the record, no, I'm not a redneck and no, I wasn't going for a camo theme... the khaki and chocolate (and obviously black) bits will go well with yellow or orange keys in the body... I might even get by with some blues in there... I mostly wanted a sort of khaki-pants-this-goes-with-everything look.)
I'm happy with it, for sure.
SECOND ENTRY: I did an overspray test on the bottom plate, to see what would happen if i tried to get it to run.... it wouldn't run. Oh, I'm sure I could have made it run, if I'd been stupid about it, but in a normal use case (like all those runs I get on every friggin piece of material I try to spray), it seems to just soak right in. The parts I sprayed with it also seem to have kept their original texture (much like the dyed keys). I'm not sure what property of the spray causes that, but it sure gives even results. Someone else on this thread suggested it, so I have to give them all the credit. You can find the stuff at Advanced Auto Parts and places like it. It's pretty expensive at almost $8/can, but the results are worth it IMO.
I forgot to mention in my op that I took a cotton ball and rubbed the entire frame down with 91% isopropyl before I sprayed it. I'm not sure if that opens up the plastic or what, but it sure didn't take any time for the keys to stain.
One more thing; I mentioned it earlier, and it's been covered exhaustively in this thread, but be sure that any keys you're going to drop into the dye are PBT and not ABS plastic (you should see them labeled on the non-visible sides) as the ABS has a very low melting point and WILL warp and break (see poor lam47's destroyed keys for examples). You may as well skip even trying with the larger pieces (spacebar and frame) as these seem to be made almost exclusively of ABS (and who has a pot big enough for a keyboard frame?? also, that may dilute the dye too much).
YMMV, but I got VERY even results with the alcohol pre-bath (maybe 45 seconds of agitation and then rinse them off). Best of luck to anybody else that wants to try.
FINAL: I followed the above described method again for keys from 3 different Cherry boards (all are interchangeable, one set from a MX 11900 board, 2 sets from Cherry MX 8000 POS boards. I had a free weekend, so I took apart both of the POS boards and modded one to Ergo-Clears (the alpha-num-pad keys and a couple others), and modded my 11900 to Ghetto Reds (just the alpha-num-pad keys). The donor board from which I pulled the Clear stems also donated its keycaps and a couple of switches (I damaged a couple on the 11900 and the POS Browns board) to the overall project. I dyed one set RIT Scarlet (took the longest), one set RIT Royal Blue, one set RIT Navy Blue (watch these VERY closely... they came out Navy, but another 15 seconds and they would have been black) and I died all the relegendable keys RIT Black*.
The 11900 frame I painted with Duplicolor Vinyl and Fabric spray, Silver. Since I had two 8000 frames, I painted one flat black and the other I did a base-coat of flat black and stood back 3 feet to apply a spattered "starry sky" effect. The space bars and mouse buttons on the touchpad were sprayed with Krylon Chrome spray paint... this proved to be a bad decision. I found that by the end of the first DAY of use I had a spot where I'd rubbed through the chrome paint to the underlying flat black (the duplicolor). I have a spare space bar that I'm going to wax with carnauba to see if that helps prevent abrasion. If that's not a better solution, I'll scrub it and repaint with some other color.
Now for some pictures. I set it up such that I can swap all the colors around into any combo I want. I started out with a Captain America theme, Navy and Red, and Spiderman theme, Royal Blue and Red. Then I got bored with that and moved all the red keys to the 11900 (get it? Ghetto Reds... sorry...) and had alternating blues on the Ergo Clears board. I got tired of that pretty quickly, too. When I was pulling keys to die the various colors, I threw some of the modifier keys into red and some into navy blue, but not into royal. I think it looks striking with the red modifiers. Also included are two PBT keys that came from the factory red to show the results.
Before:
[ Guests cannot view attachments ] 24333[/ATTACH]
[ Guests cannot view attachments ] 24334[/ATTACH]
After:
[ Guests cannot view attachments ] 24320[/ATTACH]
[ Guests cannot view attachments ] 24321[/ATTACH]
[ Guests cannot view attachments ] 24322[/ATTACH]
[ Guests cannot view attachments ] 24323[/ATTACH]
[ Guests cannot view attachments ] 24324[/ATTACH]
[ Guests cannot view attachments ] 24326[/ATTACH]
[ Guests cannot view attachments ] 24327[/ATTACH]
[ Guests cannot view attachments ] 24328[/ATTACH]
[ Guests cannot view attachments ] 24329[/ATTACH]
[ Guests cannot view attachments ] 24336[/ATTACH]
*As it turned out, the relegendable keys are ABS and warped up a good bit... I managed to scrounge a whole set, but only barely. I should have just left them the dark grey they turned after about 2 minutes... 3 minutes proved too much.
