Oh boy, I've never done one of these before and I'm so betting my formatting is going to be crap, but here we go. Using LastPilot's fantastic Crystal TKL build log as a template, though my camera comes from Idaho (no offense to Idahoans). I will be putting little summations of each section up, but the more in-depth stuff will be viewable by clicking "more."
This log itself took a few hours to put together. Enjoy!
Okay, so here comes the prep work. As I was originally going for a carbon fiber case, I had originally foreseen using aluminum feet to give the board some angle (I use an Octagon as my daily driver, so I really like angle), and so the first parts I got were
GON sky blue aluminum feet from the ever so helpful
icyskyz.
KEYBOARD FEET: 
I had sold some aluminum feet I had procured from Bucky for a separate build during a time when I planned on stepping away from keyboards. Cherry MX boards fell out of interest with me, but then Alps came in along with this idea. I sold these to Icyskyz, but then needed some again. Bucky originally had the two colors but preferred sky blue (which is what I had hoped for), he then sold them to icyskyz. So, in the end, I bought the sky clue GON feet from Icy and he got the silver ones from me.
STABS: 
After this, I needed the screw-in stabs. Thankfully, the ever-so-awesome
Spamray managed to help me out with finding a few! They were the new design with the "mushy legs" on the stab dummies, but nothing a clipping couldn't handle. Thanks, man. You've always been a big help!
I also bought some gold stabs from icyskyz. I already had 7u stabs and enough for my build, but I wanted enough for a 6.25u build as well. Thanks to you, Kent. You helped out a bunch!
SWITCHES: 
After this, I believe I got the switches. Well, not exactly. I bought a Zenith Z-150 in hopes of getting some greens, but I got some yellows instead.
After this, I took up
Ludovician's offer to trade me some fantastic-condition SKCL Green Alps that came from a board that seemed untouched for decades. I knew the chances of finding an Alps board this mint would be very slim, so I traded the SKCM Blue Alps I stripped from a Leading Edge DC-2014 (forgot one switch, sorry man
).
HOTSWAP SOCKETS:
Of course, how could I forget these! These are the sockets that do the business, and by business, I mean that hotswappable switch and LED goodness that's getting so popular right now! The idea was originally conceived by PopReference for his
Winkeyless.kr build, which he in-turn got from the infamous Smart 68. I had talked to him about my idea of doing this for Alps, and we narrowed down the sockets that would work.
Ultimately, we settled on
these for the switches and
these for the LEDs, the former of which would require widening of all switch pin holes on the PCB in order to fit. These require no solder to work and sit flush with the PCB!
PCB:
So, this was kinda tricky, but went amazingly well. First, I tried putting out ads on MechMarket and the classfieds here on GeekHack, but to no avail. I then tried messaging someone on the Leeku Eagle/Viper PCB Interest Check page who mentioned not liking their Eagle's PCB much.
Deci really helped me out. He offered me the PCB. If I paid the price of shipping. I had to handle the desolder work, but miraculously I managed to get all of the Cherry MX switches off his board without a single pad lifting. Duck PCBs have never had good reliability in that area in my experience. Before this though, our terms for the PCB kinda fell through and the mega awesome
bweeldreyer offered me a brand new never touched Eagle PCB for $50. Then Deci came through like a champ and I ended up with two PCBs!
PLATE:
This is where it gets tricky and where a lot of people would have told me it couldn't be done. Sure, BlueNalgene's Alps GB could have provided a plate and PCB, but these veered slightly off of my mission goal as they would not provide a universal layout nor backlighting. I still love your PCB's, Hasu.
So, this is when my mind got jogged and I had a "holy ****" moment when I remembered seeing
Leandre's 60% plate sales
advertised on Reddit and noticed the carbon fiber plate and how its universal design by
JDCarpe allowed Alps switches to fit into the plate.
As I'm sure LeandreN knows, I practically begged for these when I missed out on the original batch. Luckily, opportunity landed upon me, and I was able to secure two plates! This was perfect! Not only will it work for my Alps build, but I'll be able to try out an exotic material which has seldom been in builds to date. Sweet! Thanks LeandreN and JD for the plate and design!
CASE:
So, this was also another weird one. Originally, I was planning on just getting a case from HeedPantSnow once he was done his awesome
carbon fiber keyboard base project. When I had landed two PCBs, I thought of just getting two or maybe an acrylic case. Then I had just jokingly said that I'd do anything for a red Hammer case in the Alps Party thread, and what do you know, I suddenly have the opportunity land in my lap, courtesy of
JDCarpe. Thanks a lot, dude!
LEDs: 
I decided I wanted to use form-fitting LED, so I bought some LEDs in the form factor intended for Alps switches.
Rectangular 2x5x7mm LEDs in 9 colors. I bought 60 of each color. Also purchased a pack of 0805 SMD LEDs to customize lighting for the bottom LEDs.
KEYCAPS: 
A very important part of this build was
Badwrench's Alps DCS Modifier pack. Thanks to SP's misprint issue, I had enough for these two. I'm also glad I picked up the additional standard layout pack option!. Beyond this, I had a few options from boards I stripped of their switches or others that had met an unfortunate fate (RIP NTC 6151N). I had caps from an AEK, my NTC 6151N, and I even bought a Dell AT101 w/ Salmon Alps specifically for this build. I ended up feeling for the AT101 and restored it instead of taking its caps.
Ultimately, I went with the NTC 6151N caps for the Eagle in the 104-style Standard ANSI layout. I used some Grey doubleshots that I got as part of a trade from
sth on the HHKB-style Eagle. In the future, all black blanks (or Infinity DSA), Lastpilot's Graphite replica set, and Alpine Winter are all options.
For the space bars, there were no options, so I had to perform a stem swap for this build. I used my Gateron 7u PBT space bar and a 7u GMK Triumph Adler space bar courtesy of
eksuen. Stems were taken from the junky caps my FAME originally came with and some caps from a Zenith Z-150, both ABS.
The 6.25u space bar came from the Tai Hao Olivette Alps set, which miraculously had Cherry mount stabilizer stems.
Miscellaneous parts: Cable: 
- I bought some long 15 foot mini USB cables for using to make more custom cables for my Octagon and Lightpad (still haven't made one for the Lightpad
). Since I already have one for the Octagon, I used a cable for the Eagle instead. - Then I bought some carbon fiber sleeve for sleeving the cable as I had wanted to make a fully CF build! Gotta be careful with this though, since it is conductive. You don't want it touching any of your pins.
- I also had some shrink tubing left over from other cable builds. The black was a bit too big for the mini end of the cable, but it worked out.
Additional Switches: - Traded crazy sth 63 SKCM Blue Alps for 40 linear brown Alps + the grey ABS doublehshot caps that now adorn my keyboard (love them man)!
- Bought an Apple IIc A2S4100 for some Amber Alps. Absolutely hated them.
- Had an assortment of switches laying around from other keyboards. Blues, Oranges, Yellows.
Sorbothane Dampening Sheet- This was taken from my Infinity, as it's currently out of commission due to a combination of my right thumb being janked up and the typing feel being too harsh
- Eventually, I will buy more sheet in the future
So, to begin:
No big deal. I already spent
$100 $165 on the holtite sockets. There's no going back now! I bought a drill press for this expressed purpose. I had to be sure my drilling would be as steady as possible so I didn't royally screw something up.
Since the tin-plated holtite sockets came in first, I tested one position with them. This is an example of my impatience giving way to impulsive behavior!
Worked like a charm! Er, but I have to get this out now, because THIS is the brand new PCB and I -want- GOLD in it. Well, it worked, but it was scary to pull out.
PROTIP: Use a soldering iron to heat the socket up when inserting or removing.
Guess what came in like a day or two later?
Yep.
My brand new scalpel. American-made. Surgical steel. Made to last a lifetime.
Oh, well... These came in too! Oh yesssss! Pretty gold-plated sockets. (note: gold doesn't actually do anything, not for switches [or stab wires or springs] anyway)
Oh but it looks so pretty; stop preaching heresy, you parenthetical information, you!
So sparkly and bedazzling, dayum. <3 Okay, but it's time to get back to business. These things are tiny, and I only have enough for a few mistakes, so I can't fuhq up too many times without grave consequences. I counted 73 possible switch positions on the Eagle, so I just multiplied that by two for the sockets.
I did not account for the fact that the Caps Lock position had THREE positions: Non-stepped,
ALPS stepped, and Cherry stepped. Alps stepped is not the same as Cherry stepped. It's pretty much in the middle of both. This meant I had a wee bit fewer spare sockets than I thought. I actually had more LED sockets since I forgot that the multiple layout positions only used one additional socket, not two. The Caps Lock position had four total.
Anyway! On with the pictures!
I know, it looks like my poor PCB is sitting in a torture room.
DRILL TO THE PAD IF YOU DON'T SHARE YOUR SECRETS, PCB!
One thing that's very important to realize about Alps and the Duck Eagle PCB that you should seriously consider if you ever decide on doing this or just using Alps in general on an Eagle is that the Cherry MX switch positions are not 1:1 with the Alps switch positions.
I mean this in terms of the actual layout offerings. You are pretty much stuck with a modified Dell AT101 / SGI Granite layout with the only alternative option being a 15u number row (HHKB style), but no short shift + 1u and no 6.25u ANSI bottom row, and no Cherry-stepped Caps Lock. Personally, I think this is a little short-sighted since Alps boards had some of the most varied layouts out there and could have worked with the HHKB layout and such.
I threw limitations to the wind and realized that I had a drill press.
So, upon this great realization, I decided to make my own options. I drilled out positions for every layout available, including the 6.25u ANSI layout, the short shift + 1 layout, and the Caps Lock positions. I didn't notice the Alps stepped position until way after since it looks really strange and only has a fraction of a pad touching each position, so it was easy to miss.
As you can see by the picture above, I had to repair and rewire some traces. The caps lock position was a unique situation where I actually had to reroute and cut a trace or two to get it to work, but it does indeed work.
After widening all the holes and creating the extra positions myself, I started slipping the sockets in. I would recommend a wide-nosed soldering tip for this. The last thing you want is your 300C soldering iron to be digesting your PCB as the tip gets stuck in a socket it after pushing it in. Trust me. You don't want that.
And done! Kinda... (I wasn't expecting it to work like magic when I was done anyway.
) I had to remove several sockets from the custom switch positions due to my lack of awareness of the copper beneath the solder mask acting as the ground plane. I'm a tinkerer, not a circuitry enthusiast.
So, I removed them, used a mill bit on a very low speed on my dremel to remove the copper from the areas and then reinserted the sockets. I used epoxy putty to rebuild any areas I mucked up and used conductive ink to repair any delicate traces where solder would've been impossible to use. On some occasions I used thin wire as seen above.
I also coated any bare wire I used in acrylic black paint via a gundam paint pen just to make sure it'd be insulated.
Here, you can see the rewiring I did for the Caps Lock switch. Because of an oddness in the way the pads were set up (not even sure how to describe it, but there was a conflicting position when the stepped position was used), I had to cut the trace on the left-most position, rewire it to the ground plane which the right-most position is also connected to, and then just make sure everything was connected right for the adjacent pads. The first time I did this, I forgot to check the other side and cut the trace going to the row on that end. Everything worked out in the end, but in the beginning, this caused the keyboard to start the bootloader every time it was plugged in.
Well, THAT'S done (I forgot to mention that I had to do all of the LEDs too)! Oh, but wait...
Deci's PCB! Desoldered the switches from his old build and prepped it for sockets.
That's right, I had to do this twice over, and I DID. I drilled out all positions including the custom positions like in my last layout. However, this time it went by very quickly with few errors since I knew what I was doing. I was so DONE with all the drilling at this point, that I did not document the second PCB's build log aside from the two prior pictures.
I decided to do this like a DAY before Leandre's carbon fiber plates came in, haha. Great timing!
Now, onto the switch modding! I actually did this before the second PCB, but since it's a separate process, I decided to structure it this way.
Now, even if Alps switches have LED slots in the top housing, this does not mean they will have leg hole positions in the bottom of the housing. That's only for switches that came from the factory that way, usually for indicator lights. Sooo... I had to manually hand drill each one of these to accommodate LEDs. That's right, no power tools for this delicate job. Don't ask me how long it took, because I don't know.
We're getting there!
I also did this on each pass after or before the drilling. I know, it looks like I'm holding my switches hostage again. I promise I'm not. I just had to get some of that extra solder off of its legs. See? I'm helping!
Down the rabbit hole of linear goodness you go!
So, after a while, I finished up all the drilling, likely needing some good hand stretches after using that pin vise for so long. Oh, but yeah... Yeah, of course there's more!
See, I don't really like spring ping. I don't like it for Cherry MX, and I don't like it for Alps SKCL or SKCM. This is also a reason I've shied away from Model [letter]s too.
So, since I've modded my fair share of MX switches, I knew that lubing them would cut or eliminate the ping altogether. So, I spent about three hours lubing 83 Green Alps switches. Cheers.
Victorinox is fantastic for anything metal in my experience. Springs are no exception.
After a greasy couple of hours with lube, toothpicks, and a brush, I finally reached gratification. Nirvana. Euphoria. No, I just lubed some switches.
V is for Victorinox V is for Vendetta V is for Victory V is for Vanquishing spring ping!
It's break time!!!!!
Zzzz...
Sooo, the morning after...
I had 540 - 60 LEDs to "deflange." Of the 540 I purchased, the UV/purple ones didn't have flanges. Now, flanged LEDs of this type can still slip into the housing, but they are a little tighter and kind of "lock" in due to the flange. Being that I want things to be modular and don't want this to be hell every time I want to change LED colors, I decided to ensure smooth insertion and removal of LEDs if need be.
It actually went by quicker than I had imagined, but it was very mundane and monotonous and man, was I bored for most of it. Also wore a mask for this since ground up epoxy coated my entire workbench after I was done.
Oh, but it does work. It does work!
*collapses from exhaustion*
Two major goals and proofs of concept reached:
The board works without soldering anything, and the LEDs function perfectly!We're closing in on actually having a keyboard now!
Heeey, the carbon fiber plates came in! Seriously surprised me with how light they were! Only 24 grams. Much lighter than any plate I've ever handled. Well, I did mess with an acrylic plate for rainb1ood when I built his Orion v2, but the feeling of carbon fiber ANYTHING is something I've never experienced before.
Welp, at this point, I started clipping stabs and lubing the wires and what not. For one PCB, I used screw-in stabs, for the other, I used normal PCB stabs.
Surprisingly, the Alps switches fit very snug in the plate and do not have any play in them at all! The only positions that have a little play are in the more universal areas, mainly the bottom row really. It's not much though. This plate feels more solid to me than the Infinity plate, even though they are clearly derived from the same design.
PRO TIP: Always insert the switches with the LEDs installed, do not do what I did and put the switches in and then the LEDs. You won't have a good time.
I should mention that the HHKB-style Eagle is using All SKCL Green Alps, while the ANSI-style Eagle is a hodge-podge, using SKCL Brown Alps for the modifiers, and SKCM Blue Alps elsewhere. It went through a few phases of using SKCM Blue Alps for the alphas, then SKCM Orange Alps for the number row and additional keys, then I swapped orange for SKCM Amber Alps.
I'm actually still waiting for the blues to come in, as I have traded the ambers away for them. I very much dislike Ambers.
THE FINAL STRETCH
(This is also the part where I started to get pretty tired during writing this!
)
So, the PCB is done. Everything from here on is almost totally cosmetic or down to user preference!
I should mention that around this time, I changed the SMD LEDs on the Eagle PCBs to blue for the HHKB-style and white for ANSI.
To make accommodations for the HHKB-style Eagle, I had done a stem swap on the Triumph Adler 7u space bar that I had received from
eksuen, but since it didn't match my preferred grey key cap set, I decided to ultimately use my 7u Gateron PBT space bar for the build. The TA bar will be good for Alpine Winter, as the 7u stabs on a DCS donor I had did not have proper spacing for Cherry-mount stabs. I should mention that I also painted the inside of the TA spacebar black due to light bleed.
I used Badwrench's Alps DCS modifiers for the surrounding keys as they have Cherry mount stab stems and work perfectly with the PCB stabs!
The carbon fiber combined with the grey and black inside of the caps I chose slightly diminished the backlighting, though I find the subtle appearance to be quite appealing and classy!
For the standard layout Eagle, I decided to go with the caps I had from my NTC 6151N, which are similar to Cherry profile caps as opposed to DCS. I used the Misprinted caps from the same Mods GB to cover the mods on this build.
It was around this point that I managed to grab a Hammer case, thanks to JDCarpe!
But, while I was waiting, I decided to make a custom cable for the build. Being as the build was and still is focused around carbon fiber, I chose a carbon fiber sleeve for the cable. I used black shrink tube with a blue ring of shrink tube over that to give it a fun contrast. Blue goes well with the mods, so I figured why not!
Oh... but nothing could prepare me for...
The most beautiful 60% case I've ever seen. There are a lot of amazing offerings out there, from IMSTO, to FMJ, to the Duck Poker cases and so on, but this case has always been a favorite of mine every time I'd stumble upon a board with one. I had never seen a red one until recently, so I was even more shocked when JD heard my call when I jokingly said I'd do anything for one of these...
Two ducks, one hammer. Oh wow, that really doesn't sound right. XD; Anyway! I decided to do away with the shelf-liner sheet and replace it with the sorbothane sheet I had used for my Infinity since that board is currently not being used. Shelf-liner is great, mind you, but sorbothane... Well, it's fantastic.
So, time to install the PCB(s)!
Despite the Eagle/Viper PCB having different mounting positions than a standard Poker-inspired PCB, four positions were still possible for the screws. I ultimately decided to go with only two since that allowed me to replace the PCBs as desired without having to take off stabilized caps every time I wanted to swap them out.
I also opted to use hex screws because a hex wrench is much smaller and gets a better hold of the screws. A huge plus, especially if you magnetize the wrench.
Eventually, I plan on having each Eagle having its own case, so I won't need to worry about swapping much, but this is how I've got it going for now.
The following shots are just some glam shots showing both PCBs and such:
I know that blue and red are bitter enemies, but I love me some blood red cases when it comes to aluminum. Eventually, I'll have more options for modifier caps, but I like how it looks right now! I really love the grey, but the ANSI Eagle looks nice too with its sparkling white caps.
DONE!!!It's taken so many months, a lot of money, a lot of luck, and a lot of patience and diligence to get this build done, but I am so happy to actually be able to use a board that once only existed in my dreams, haha.
So, by the point I had completed both boards, a lot of my acquisitions ended up leaving me high and dry of SKCM Blue Alps switches due to trading them for the SKCL Brown Alps + caps, and the SKCL Green Alps. I was seriously missing them, but I wasn't about to salvage them from my fully functional and restored FAME. At the end, I was left with only 27 blue Alps switches.
In hopes that SKCM Amber Alps really was like SKCM Blue Alps, I decided to bite the bullet and I landed an Apple IIc A2S4100 for $48 on eBay.
Yep, that's Amber Alps alright! They felt really nice when I wasn't directly comparing them to Blue Alps.
The IIc came with three Alps SKCL lock switches, which was not expected, but a pleasant surprise nonetheless!
With the board desoldered, it's time to test out the hotswapping!
This was a good way of getting the switches near the edges loose, but while the sockets don't exactly have a death grip on the switches' pins, the plate maintains a very firm grip, which, combined with the sockets, makes it rather difficult to pull them out. This is not an issue for Cherry MX, as it has retaining tabs that can be hooked onto with proper tools to unclip and remove them from a plate. Not such with Alps. I'm still trying to figure out a good way to do this.
In the end, I did not like Amber Alps at all. I tried them side-by-side with blues, and I tried them taking up the majority of the board (mods and such use SKCL brown Alps for backlighting), but I just did not enjoy the feel. It's not that the weight is too great for me, as I had no problems with MX Green switches, it's that the sharpness of the tactility is very great. I feel as if a lot of the resistance in the stroke comes from the tactile bump itself. Once the tactile bump is overcome, there is a pretty sheer drop all the way down.
I measured these switches to be 80g at actuation. I didn't yet measure bottom-out force.
The sound of the click was also not as pleasant to my ears as the click of a blue alps switch. It felt less refined and a little cheaper. Blue Alps clicks remind me of rainfall or billiard balls clacking, both of which are pleasant sounds. To me anyway.
) The Amber Alps' click reminds me of a ratchet or something. Yeah, not as classy, right?
Ready to be shipped out and traded for blue alps!
Without these people, I would have never been able to create this, so thanks to all of you!
If anyone has been missed, I apologize! Thanks to all the component manufacturers as well, haha. Couldn't do it without those guys!
