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geekhack Marketplace => Vendor Forums => The Keyboard Company => Topic started by: British on Fri, 25 June 2010, 08:16:27

Title: Key sets
Post by: British on Fri, 25 June 2010, 08:16:27

Hey Bruce,

Since you guys will soon™ receive european-flavored Filcos, is there any hope of having you sell keycaps sets of those layouts ?
Maybe even Cherry ones (not necessarily double-shots, heh)...

Title: Key sets
Post by: Bruce on Fri, 25 June 2010, 14:48:56

Hi British.

I could liberate a keyset from a Filco for you.
Cherry is more difficult.

Title: Key sets
Post by: British on Sat, 26 June 2010, 14:43:24

How difficult would that be ? :smile:
From what I gathered being around this forum, Cherry doesn't seem to care much about making it easy for us enthusiasts to get some parts, so I guess key sets are on the same (drowning) boat.

Regarding the Filcos, I asked in the first place because you're selling blank sets, and since you're getting more and more non-uk/non-us layouts...

Title: Key sets
Post by: Bruce on Mon, 28 June 2010, 15:21:01

Over £100 difficult.
Cherry (ZF, I should say - but probably never will) seem to semi-support it. We get some help from Cherry UK with blanks but there's high MOQs and they don't keep any 'sets'.
It will vary around the world as their regional businesses are independent.
A lot of Cherry is used in specialist POS applications so there are people who will print what you want but it is expensive and they prefer to do it when you're buying the keyboard as well, partly because that makes it easier. There is always a big thing over the bigger keys too.
It's not too bad considering it is ending up being a one off.
Filco do sets so it works.

It was considered with Filco to stock bare boards and keysets as separate items to give flexibility but it added to cost quite a lot and didn't give a huge amount more flexibility.

Title: Key sets
Post by: British on Tue, 29 June 2010, 02:39:31

OK then, I guess I'll buy some not-so-cheap G81 for the Cherry keys...

Filco-wise, you say they do sets, but the only ones you guys sell are blank.
So when I buy a Filco from you (see what I did there ? :wink:), and, for the sake of the discussion, my fingers are dripping acid 24/7, thus wearing out my keycaps fast, and I'm not touch-typist... what do I do ? :smile:

Title: Key sets
Post by: Bruce on Tue, 29 June 2010, 09:32:48

If I have to - I can swap a set of blanks onto a stock board, sell you the ones I pulled and sell the board as an 'otaku'.

Funny thing - some people do seem to drip acid.
We get boards back worn blank, quite often.
Has never happened on a Filco though.

Title: Key sets
Post by: British on Tue, 29 June 2010, 11:17:46

OK, good to know.

Thanks for your time :smile:

Title: Key sets
Post by: Findecanor on Wed, 30 June 2010, 03:45:07

Could Filco keys be sanded down (on the underside) to the same height as regular Cherry keys? Would they be noticably different?

Title: Key sets
Post by: Bruce on Wed, 30 June 2010, 05:56:27

That might work.
There's guys on here who have done a lot of Keycap 'modding' and would be better placed than me to say.
A belt sander would shorten them effectively I guess, but you could catch the fitting part if it went too low. I'm not sure I can recomend it.

Title: Key sets
Post by: British on Wed, 30 June 2010, 06:34:57

There's a wiki (http://geekhack.org/showwiki.php?title=Key+Reference+-+Pics+and+specifications+for+various+manufacturers+keys) that might give you some answers.

Title: Print quality
Post by: Terrysko on Thu, 05 August 2010, 11:05:45

Quote from: Bruce;197542

Funny thing - some people do seem to drip acid.
We get boards back worn blank, quite often. Has never happened on a Filco though.

That's no wonder, try to analyse sweat, the mixture is close to acid.

Title: Key sets
Post by: itlnstln on Mon, 09 August 2010, 07:33:38

Sweat is basically pee minus the waste.