TL;DR - I made a custom acrylic case with an integrated plate and some anodized aluminum hardware, it looks like this:The IdeaFirst off, I want to acknowledge there are some nice sandwiched acrylic cases out there (Smashing Acrylics comes to mind); but I wanted to try something a little more intricate.
I knew when I ordered my BananaSplit60 PCB that I was going to attempt building my own case from scratch, so I skipped a plate entirely. I wasn't sure exactly what it was going to look like, but I had a general "electronic" theme in mind.
Since GMK Laser wasn't dropping for some time, I opted to pick up some "placeholder" keycaps, and I've honestly found them to be much more satisfying than I anticipated. So
unfortunately that means a fresh build for GMK Laser
After I got my keycaps, switches and PCB in, it was time to sit down and design something I could actually cut with my laser. After staring at some pictures on my
Cyberpunk Inspiration board on Pinterest I came up with this:
I wanted the plate to include circuitry traces, but I knew drawing those out was going to be futile. Next I had to draw up the sketch into something digital.
My weapon of choice here is Affinity Designer. A great alternative to Adobe Illustrator if you're on a budget. I had a couple sheets of florescent green acrylic lying around, so I went with that for my first color scheme.
The First CutAdmittedly, this is one of the more complex designs I've run on this laser. Not to mention I had just replaced the CO
2 tube because the original gave out
and I had a jam-up which knocked a belt loose and caused some serious issues along the Y-axis.
After a few small test cuts, it was time...
A good action shot of etching the plate.
And all the pieces cut next to the original sketch.
Layers stacked along with the test cut.
The AssemblyWith all the pieces cut, it was time to start putting it all together. Little did I know peeling the protective paper off the acrylic was going to be a project in and of itself. Seriously, having all of those trace lines cut up the paper into hundreds of small pieces. I also had to figure out the Cherry stabilizers; I really don't remember putting them together like this on my first build (maybe they were plate-mount? I'll have to look).
I was making some great headway, getting the stabilizers and switches installed on the PCB (no solder at this point, thankfully I wanted a full dry-fit first) and ready to put the two pieces together...
but if you've ever done this before there is something terribly wrong with the picture above. You see, the key switches need to go into the
plate first. So I had to take
all of the switches out of the PCB and start over.
SO, I peeled off the masking paper from the top of the plate (really easy on this side, just one piece) and tried again.
Yeah, it was time to bring it all together. So I bused out the anodized aluminum screws and standoffs I had and got busy.
Nice. All of the screw holes aligned up perfectly, and all the hardware fit like it should. I was so glad my laser repairs were a success
Now, keycaps!
This is a simple 104-key set I found on Amazon for under $25. They are double-shot typewriter-style black with a clear acrylic outer. I figured being black and clear they would look good with whatever color scheme I went with. The typewriter-style gave a great benefit for this build:
The extra space between keys leaves the plate details much more visible.
At this point, things were going great, a little
too great. It was about time to see what Mr. Murphy had to say about this build.
The AdjustmentsThe first indication something was wrong was how the space and shift keys were behaving: they weren't popping up to full height. It took several times popping of the keycaps, checking the switches, and playing around with the stabilizers until I figured out what the root cause was.
Here it is. See that metal bar going across the top of the stabilizers? When a key is raised, that bar needs to extend beyond the bottom of the plate. See the notches at the
bottom of the stabilizer cut-outs? Yeah. Those are where the bar is supposed to go.
So what happened? The BananaSplit60 PCB uses keys "upside down" from the Cherry default (LED holes facing towards you) and all of the stabilizers are mounted this direction too (except for the default backspace, which I'm not using). Interestingly swill's plate & case builder doesn't have a "flip stabilizer" cutout option. At first I thought I must've missed it, but I went back and double-checked and couldn't find it.
Since the rest of the plate was fitting great, all the switches were secure and well aligned, I didn't want to re-cut the plate... soo.... files. The metal kind.
Yup. A pinhole file and some elbow grease should fix that right up. Except it didn't. It was only a half-success. The keys were making it further up, but still felt somewhat sticky. Also...
The stabilizers were pushing the PCB away from the bottom of the switches (notice that gap on the right where you can see the switch pins on top of the PCB.)
Bottom line: Cherry switches are designed for a 1.5mm plate. The stabilizers are designed with this distance in mind. My plate is 3mm acrylic, so the stabilizers were keeping the PCB too far away.
The fix? More filing. Specifically making the stabilizer cutout large enough for the stabilizer to fit
into the plate instead of under it.
Great success! All the stabilizer keys were now popping up to full height like they were supposed to, and maybe even more importantly, there was no gap between the PCB and switches anymore.
I've really appreciate how sturdy this PCB is, it helped keep this all-plastic build solid.
Soldier Time!
With my trusty probably-older-than-me-hand-me-down soldering iron, I put my serviceable soldering skills to work.
The "Final" ResultYou see it's really not final, but I took some photos anyway.
The StatsSo, here are some details for those interested.
Circuit Board: BananaSplit60
Key Switches: Greetech Blues w/ 50A o-rings
Keycaps: E-Elements Double-shot Crystal Keycaps
Case: Custom Laser-Cut 4-layer Acrylic with M3 Anodized Aluminum Screws and Standoffs
AcknowledgementsI have to give a big thank you to the Keyboard Layout Editor and the swillkb plate & case builder--I couldn't have done this project without those tools.
And of course evangs and arhipio for putting together the BananaSplit60 group buy.
There are a few more pictures I didn't post in the
Imgur albumI wish I had access to a GMK Terminal set to put on this
I'd love to do this in other colors too. I've got a couple updates I've done to the board to since I took these pictures, so I'll have to get some new ones taken. Expect an update to this thread.