Author Topic: Home made plates  (Read 13829 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Offline Tiramisuu

  • Posts: 329
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #50 on: Sun, 19 October 2014, 16:05:04 »
If you don't cut outside the lines and have a decent set of small files I would think you could cut quite a nice plate over a weekend.    If you are of the mindset that your hours are worth a specific amount of money and you need to make a board and get a 35% profit margin out of it then it is impossible without expensive tools BUT...

If it is a hobby for yourself then something extremely high quality can be made with a high cost in labour hours but very little in terms of machinery or other capital costs.
Keyboard error F1 to continue.

Poker 2, Gherkin, Lets Split, Planck, Filco

Offline Tiramisuu

  • Posts: 329
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #51 on: Sun, 19 October 2014, 16:10:25 »
Keyboard error F1 to continue.

Poker 2, Gherkin, Lets Split, Planck, Filco

Offline Tiramisuu

  • Posts: 329
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #52 on: Sun, 19 October 2014, 16:13:50 »
Keyboard error F1 to continue.

Poker 2, Gherkin, Lets Split, Planck, Filco

Offline Tiramisuu

  • Posts: 329
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #53 on: Sun, 19 October 2014, 16:20:22 »
Keyboard error F1 to continue.

Poker 2, Gherkin, Lets Split, Planck, Filco

Offline swill

  • * Elevated Elder
  • Thread Starter
  • Posts: 3365
  • Location: Canada eh
  • builder & enabler
    • swillkb.com
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #54 on: Sun, 19 October 2014, 17:42:25 »
If you don't cut outside the lines and have a decent set of small files I would think you could cut quite a nice plate over a weekend.    If you are of the mindset that your hours are worth a specific amount of money and you need to make a board and get a 35% profit margin out of it then it is impossible without expensive tools BUT...

If it is a hobby for yourself then something extremely high quality can be made with a high cost in labour hours but very little in terms of machinery or other capital costs.
Ya. I would rather spend labor than money if I can. :)

I will check your new videos when I have a minute. Thx.

Offline Melvang

  • Exquisite Lord of Bumfluff
  • * Maker
  • Posts: 4398
  • Location: Waterloo, IA
  • Melvang's Desktop Customs
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #55 on: Sun, 19 October 2014, 18:04:45 »
You could home build fibreglass or carbon fibre pretty easily.
There is a cadre of people on this forum heavily invested in selling these things so every time some one asks about prototyping diy at home the answer is always laser, waterjet , cnc.

Complete horse poo.   There are about a million diy approaches  to pcb making on youtube.    The same goes for cutting and cleaning up metal.   A die grinder would be nice but a drill press, a dremel and a small set of files would do the job just fine.   Aluminum is messy but easy to cut.

Home Depot or Canadian Tire have nice little pieces of metal to do that with.

CnC machining is like using a nuke to kill a sparrow.

While I usually suggest waterjet or laser for plate manufacture, it can be done for relatively cheap capital investment but like you said very expensive in the personal labor.  This was the biggest reason I suggested it for Swill here.  Not that he can't achieve a quality product but I know his personal project time is at a very high premium with all he has going on right now. 

Also, the biggest reason I suggest this route for someone looking to sell them is the tolerances needed for a quality switch plate are very tight for what the average person can achieve with hand tools.  Very expensive tooling and equipment are needed to produce repeatable quality plates with tight tolerances.

In my job (union millwright), time investment for a job goes up at an exponential rate with the tolerances that need to be held.  This is true in any machining operation. 

I am not saying swill can't produce a switch plate worthy of selling, I just know that he won't be able to make them quick enough for a group buy type deal.  But he isn't doing it to sell.  He is doing it for prototyping purposes.
OG Kishsaver, Razer Orbweaver clears and reds with blue LEDs, and Razer Naga Epic.   "Great minds crawl in the same sewer"  Uncle Rich

Offline swill

  • * Elevated Elder
  • Thread Starter
  • Posts: 3365
  • Location: Canada eh
  • builder & enabler
    • swillkb.com
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #56 on: Sun, 19 October 2014, 21:00:40 »
You could home build fibreglass or carbon fibre pretty easily.
There is a cadre of people on this forum heavily invested in selling these things so every time some one asks about prototyping diy at home the answer is always laser, waterjet , cnc.

Complete horse poo.   There are about a million diy approaches  to pcb making on youtube.    The same goes for cutting and cleaning up metal.   A die grinder would be nice but a drill press, a dremel and a small set of files would do the job just fine.   Aluminum is messy but easy to cut.

Home Depot or Canadian Tire have nice little pieces of metal to do that with.

CnC machining is like using a nuke to kill a sparrow.

While I usually suggest waterjet or laser for plate manufacture, it can be done for relatively cheap capital investment but like you said very expensive in the personal labor.  This was the biggest reason I suggested it for Swill here.  Not that he can't achieve a quality product but I know his personal project time is at a very high premium with all he has going on right now. 

Also, the biggest reason I suggest this route for someone looking to sell them is the tolerances needed for a quality switch plate are very tight for what the average person can achieve with hand tools.  Very expensive tooling and equipment are needed to produce repeatable quality plates with tight tolerances.

In my job (union millwright), time investment for a job goes up at an exponential rate with the tolerances that need to be held.  This is true in any machining operation. 

I am not saying swill can't produce a switch plate worthy of selling, I just know that he won't be able to make them quick enough for a group buy type deal.  But he isn't doing it to sell.  He is doing it for prototyping purposes.
Ya exactly. As you know, I don't have much extra time right now, but I enjoy doing this sort of prototyping. If I come up with something cool that other people are interested in, I would absolutely be getting them professionally made.

I have to admit, I love prototyping and designing stuff and thinking outside the box, but the thought of running a GB sends chills to my bones. Haha.

Offline swill

  • * Elevated Elder
  • Thread Starter
  • Posts: 3365
  • Location: Canada eh
  • builder & enabler
    • swillkb.com
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #57 on: Sun, 19 October 2014, 21:37:06 »
In case people are wondering what my motivation is for this, here you go.  Basically, I am a software developer by trade, so there are many keys I just can not live without.  Dedicated arrow keys are just essential for me.  I also need the `/~ key on my default layer.

I have tried the 60% layout and I just can't deal with the lack of dedicated arrow keys.  I want it to work for me, but it just doesn't.  I am currently using a 75% board and I do love it, but I want to see if I can reduce the footprint even more.

So here is one of the layouts I have designed that I want to test:

80254-0

Most of the keycaps can be found in a standard set (by adding the compatibility options).  The 1.75 Shift is relatively common as an add-on option.  The 1.25 Shift is less common, but is still available in some cases.  I would use a novelty key for the `/~ key.  The 6 unit spacebar will also be a bit tricky to find in a set, but I am too OCD to not have symmetry on the bottom row. Luckily the HHKB layouts have made the 6 unit space bar a more common add-on recently, so I should be able to find it. 

I may have to have a quick look at what I ordered in the Honeywell GB and see if there are any extras of these keys just to make sure I have a set that will fit this layout.

Edit: Does anyone know if the 6 unit spacebar has its own stabilizer size or does it use the same size stab as a 6.25 unit space key?
« Last Edit: Sun, 19 October 2014, 22:32:30 by swill »

Offline dorkvader

  • Posts: 6288
  • Location: Boston area
  • all about the "hack" in "geekhack"
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #58 on: Sun, 19 October 2014, 23:47:23 »
Edit: Does anyone know if the 6 unit spacebar has its own stabilizer size or does it use the same size stab as a 6.25 unit space key?

I think the 6 unit has a different stabilizer size than most 6.25's If you see 6.25's with extra stems, i think the narrower of the outer stems also happen to correspond to the stem placement on a "normal" 6x spacebar.

I could be wrong though: I don't have any 6x spaceabr keyboards handy.

Offline swill

  • * Elevated Elder
  • Thread Starter
  • Posts: 3365
  • Location: Canada eh
  • builder & enabler
    • swillkb.com
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #59 on: Sun, 19 October 2014, 23:53:05 »
Edit: Does anyone know if the 6 unit spacebar has its own stabilizer size or does it use the same size stab as a 6.25 unit space key?

I think the 6 unit has a different stabilizer size than most 6.25's If you see 6.25's with extra stems, i think the narrower of the outer stems also happen to correspond to the stem placement on a "normal" 6x spacebar.

I could be wrong though: I don't have any 6x spaceabr keyboards handy.
I did a little looking and I might be out of luck on the 6 unit spacebar with stabs. I think I may have to just use a 6.25 unit spacebar and move the bottom row .125 units left to center that row. We will see.

Offline joric

  • Posts: 136
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #60 on: Fri, 18 March 2016, 02:07:54 »
Just discovered this sourcery http://www.aliexpress.com/item/New-1pcs-14mm-HSS-Mortising-Drill-Bit-Chisel-Cut-Square-Hole-Cutter-Mortise-Tenon-Joint/32606494380.html

This is 14mm square hole drill, $17.88, free shipping!

Did anyone try that???


Offline nubbinator

  • Dabbler Supreme
  • * Maker
  • Posts: 8658
  • Location: Orange County, CA
  • Model M "connoisseur"
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #61 on: Fri, 18 March 2016, 08:38:29 »
That's a wood bit.  The square is a chisel and it surrounds a wood drill bit.

Offline joric

  • Posts: 136
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #62 on: Fri, 18 March 2016, 12:49:22 »
That's a wood bit.  The square is a chisel and it surrounds a wood drill bit.
Well, it would work on acrylic plates, wouldn't it?

Offline neverused

  • Posts: 572
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #63 on: Fri, 18 March 2016, 13:29:31 »
That's a wood bit.  The square is a chisel and it surrounds a wood drill bit.
Well, it would work on acrylic plates, wouldn't it?
If the acrylic is crazy thick or you want it to fracture.

Offline joric

  • Posts: 136
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #64 on: Fri, 18 March 2016, 15:20:23 »
Ah, got it. Seems like the drill bit itself is round and used just for centering the chisel.

Offline Melvang

  • Exquisite Lord of Bumfluff
  • * Maker
  • Posts: 4398
  • Location: Waterloo, IA
  • Melvang's Desktop Customs
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #65 on: Fri, 18 March 2016, 19:09:31 »
That's a wood bit.  The square is a chisel and it surrounds a wood drill bit.
Well, it would work on acrylic plates, wouldn't it?
If the acrylic is crazy thick or you want it to fracture.

Yes and no. It would make a hole, but it will have a very high chance of splitting and breaking out on the backside. The other thing to remember is with acrylic, you have to be careful when selecting drill bits, especially larger ones as they can and will self feed. When this happens there are a couple things that can happen. Mostly, it will rip the piece out of the vise and damage the part.
OG Kishsaver, Razer Orbweaver clears and reds with blue LEDs, and Razer Naga Epic.   "Great minds crawl in the same sewer"  Uncle Rich

Offline neverused

  • Posts: 572
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #66 on: Fri, 18 March 2016, 19:10:34 »
That's a wood bit.  The square is a chisel and it surrounds a wood drill bit.
Well, it would work on acrylic plates, wouldn't it?
If the acrylic is crazy thick or you want it to fracture.

Yes and no. It would make a hole, but it will have a very high chance of splitting and breaking out on the backside. The other thing to remember is with acrylic, you have to be careful when selecting drill bits, especially larger ones as they can and will self feed. When this happens there are a couple things that can happen. Mostly, it will rip the piece out of the vise and damage the part.
Stepped bits are your friend for acrylic.

Offline Melvang

  • Exquisite Lord of Bumfluff
  • * Maker
  • Posts: 4398
  • Location: Waterloo, IA
  • Melvang's Desktop Customs
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #67 on: Fri, 18 March 2016, 19:59:27 »
That's a wood bit.  The square is a chisel and it surrounds a wood drill bit.
Well, it would work on acrylic plates, wouldn't it?
If the acrylic is crazy thick or you want it to fracture.

Yes and no. It would make a hole, but it will have a very high chance of splitting and breaking out on the backside. The other thing to remember is with acrylic, you have to be careful when selecting drill bits, especially larger ones as they can and will self feed. When this happens there are a couple things that can happen. Mostly, it will rip the piece out of the vise and damage the part.
Stepped bits are your friend for acrylic.

Or you can take a sharpening stone, and run it a few strokes flat across the cutting edge.  This helps tremendously for acrylic and brass both.  For more info lookup brassing off a drill bit.
OG Kishsaver, Razer Orbweaver clears and reds with blue LEDs, and Razer Naga Epic.   "Great minds crawl in the same sewer"  Uncle Rich

Offline joric

  • Posts: 136
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #68 on: Sat, 14 May 2016, 14:27:31 »
Ordered a square woodworking chisel with a round drill bit inside for $14 (there was a temporal price drop):
http://www.aliexpress.com/item/New-1pcs-14mm-HSS-Mortising-Drill-Bit-Chisel-Cut-Square-Hole-Cutter-Mortise-Tenon-Joint/32606494380.html
Will try to make a TKL board for my VB87M case from a soft plastic, maybe reinforce it with a few ribs and then do some p2p wiring (got a bag of 65g Zealios).

Of course a square 14mm broach will be better (it should work pretty well even for steel plates), but it's hard to get.
Amazon sells those for $384 a piece http://www.amazon.com/Dumont-Uncoated-Square-Metric-Broach/dp/B01BFNCPLM/

« Last Edit: Sat, 14 May 2016, 15:15:09 by joric »

Offline Data

  • Posts: 2608
  • Location: Orlando, FL
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #69 on: Sun, 15 May 2016, 16:19:50 »
Ordered a square woodworking chisel with a round drill bit inside for $14 (there was a temporal price drop):
http://www.aliexpress.com/item/New-1pcs-14mm-HSS-Mortising-Drill-Bit-Chisel-Cut-Square-Hole-Cutter-Mortise-Tenon-Joint/32606494380.html
Will try to make a TKL board for my VB87M case from a soft plastic, maybe reinforce it with a few ribs and then do some p2p wiring (got a bag of 65g Zealios).

Of course a square 14mm broach will be better (it should work pretty well even for steel plates), but it's hard to get.
Amazon sells those for $384 a piece http://www.amazon.com/Dumont-Uncoated-Square-Metric-Broach/dp/B01BFNCPLM/

Show Image


The broach is an awesome tool and it led me down a Youtube rabbit hole for several hours one day.  The problem is that a lot (all?) of these metal broaches have a minimum cutting length through the work piece.  The Dumont you linked has a minimum LOC of 1/2".  I'm not sure why, exactly, they have a minimum cut length but that limitation alone leads me to believe they're not the best tool for the materials we're talking about here: generally 1.5mm aluminum and steel plates.  The cost is another factor.

I tend to think a punch might be a better tool for this application, short of just using laser and waterjet cutting.  Although the smaller gap between switch cutouts could be a problem.

It might be easier to just find (and share!) the cheapest places to get laser/waterjet services.   :p

Offline Leslieann

  • * Elevated Elder
  • Posts: 4513
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #70 on: Sun, 15 May 2016, 17:10:07 »
Don't even bother with the thin acrylic, I tried it with a laser cutter and it was too weak, I broke it putting in the first switch. I was angry enough after spending 20 minutes waiting, I can't imagine my rage had it happened after I spent the last week hand cutting it. The same goes for wood or anything else.

You may be willing to waste time and labor, but unless you do this regularly, I think you greatly under estimate the amount of labor involved. Even using something easy to work with, four variants mean almost 400 holes. Even with a press or saw,  you will be doing a lot of hand work.  If you are going to do it, either do it with the final material so you don't have to redo it again once you find one you like (by the time you're done you won't want to do it again), or make one pattern that can hold all of the layouts you want to try, then make the final design in the right material. It makes little sense to make so many patterns when you can cut slots and just slide the switches around.


That said, my advice is this, find a local hackerspace with a laser cutter, X-Carve, Shapoko, cnc or press. Worst case, find one with a 3d printer and use that. Sitting around waiting on a print for 20 hours is still better than spending 80 hours hand filing a plate you may use for 5 minutes and throw away. 
Novelkeys NK65AE w/62g Zilents/39g springs
More
62g Zilents/lubed/Novelkeys 39g springs, HK Gaming Thick PBT caps, Netdot Gen10 magnetic cable, pic
| Filco MJ2 L.E. Vortex Case, Jailhouse Blues, heavily customized
More
Vortex case squared up/blasted finish removed/custom feet/paint/winkey blockoff plate, HID Liberator, stainless steel universal plate, 3d printed adapters, Type C, Netdot Gen10 magnetic cable, foam sound dampened, HK Gaming Thick PBT caps (o-ringed), Cherry Jailhouse Blues w/lubed/clipped Cherry light springs, 40g actuation
| GMMK TKL
More
w/ Kailh Purple Pros/lubed/Novelkeys 39g springs, HK Gaming Thick PBT caps, Netdot Gen10 Magnetic cable
| PF65 3d printed 65% w/LCD and hot swap
More
Box Jades, Interchangeable trim, mini lcd, QMK, underglow, HK Gaming Thick PBT caps, O-rings, Netdot Gen10 magnetic cable, in progress link
| Magicforce 68
More
MF68 pcb, Outemu Blues, in progress
| YMDK75 Jail Housed Gateron Blues
More
J-spacers, YMDK Thick PBT, O-rings, SIP sockets
| KBT Race S L.E.
More
Ergo Clears, custom WASD caps
| Das Pro
More
Costar model with browns
| GH60
More
Cherry Blacks, custom 3d printed case
| Logitech Illumininated | IBM Model M (x2)
Definitive Omron Guide. | 3d printed Keyboard FAQ/Discussion

Offline tufty

  • Posts: 347
  • Location: French Alps
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #71 on: Wed, 18 May 2016, 00:23:08 »
The problem is that a lot (all?) of these metal broaches have a minimum cutting length through the work piece.  The Dumont you linked has a minimum LOC of 1/2".  I'm not sure why, exactly, they have a minimum cut length but that limitation alone leads me to believe they're not the best tool for the materials we're talking about here: generally 1.5mm aluminum and steel plates.  The cost is another factor.

I tend to think a punch might be a better tool for this application

All broaches have that limitation.  Think of it as a stepped chisel, each tooth tries to take off a tiny amount of material from the edge of the hole.  If there's not enough material behind the edge, it will bend the material rather than cutting it and make what is commonly known as "a horrible mess".  Not to mention the noise.  Take a piece of thin sheet metal, put it in a vice with a couple of inches "free" above the jaws, and then hit the top, diagonally with a bastard file (thus hitting the edge "flat on" with the teeth of the file).  That's what broaching a piece of thin sheet is going to be.  You could probably get away with clamping or otherwise fixing your plate to a sacrificial block of metal (or possibly hardwood) for the duration of the process (drilling and broaching) but it would be a risky operation, IMO.

Yeah, use a punch.

14mm square stock is cheap, with a small cylindrical grinding die you can make / sharpen a punch head in seconds.  Hell, if you're doing aluminium sheet, you could make a handheld punch from CRS and not even bother to harden it (although you'd probably only get one or two clean holes out of it before having to regrind)

Might give that a go later, actually.

Offline Melvang

  • Exquisite Lord of Bumfluff
  • * Maker
  • Posts: 4398
  • Location: Waterloo, IA
  • Melvang's Desktop Customs
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #72 on: Wed, 18 May 2016, 01:17:01 »
The problem is that a lot (all?) of these metal broaches have a minimum cutting length through the work piece.  The Dumont you linked has a minimum LOC of 1/2".  I'm not sure why, exactly, they have a minimum cut length but that limitation alone leads me to believe they're not the best tool for the materials we're talking about here: generally 1.5mm aluminum and steel plates.  The cost is another factor.

I tend to think a punch might be a better tool for this application

All broaches have that limitation.  Think of it as a stepped chisel, each tooth tries to take off a tiny amount of material from the edge of the hole.  If there's not enough material behind the edge, it will bend the material rather than cutting it and make what is commonly known as "a horrible mess".  Not to mention the noise.  Take a piece of thin sheet metal, put it in a vice with a couple of inches "free" above the jaws, and then hit the top, diagonally with a bastard file (thus hitting the edge "flat on" with the teeth of the file).  That's what broaching a piece of thin sheet is going to be.  You could probably get away with clamping or otherwise fixing your plate to a sacrificial block of metal (or possibly hardwood) for the duration of the process (drilling and broaching) but it would be a risky operation, IMO.

Yeah, use a punch.

14mm square stock is cheap, with a small cylindrical grinding die you can make / sharpen a punch head in seconds.  Hell, if you're doing aluminium sheet, you could make a handheld punch from CRS and not even bother to harden it (although you'd probably only get one or two clean holes out of it before having to regrind)

Might give that a go later, actually.

I concur with all of this.  On top of during the broaching process, you push the broach through the material.  You don't strike it.  This is done with some sort of press, either hydraulic or for smaller ones, an arbor press can be used, but this is risky due to the possibility of breaking the broach.  This is another reason for the minimum depth, it helps keep the broach lined up and going in the right direction.
OG Kishsaver, Razer Orbweaver clears and reds with blue LEDs, and Razer Naga Epic.   "Great minds crawl in the same sewer"  Uncle Rich

Offline joric

  • Posts: 136
Re: Home made plates
« Reply #73 on: Thu, 24 May 2018, 08:17:37 »
A bit late but got that broach, yeah. Never really used, found a laser cutter nearby. Album: https://imgur.com/a/HyMhu

Ordered here http://www.aliexpress.com/item/New-1pcs-14mm-HSS-Mortising-Drill-Bit-Chisel-Cut-Square-Hole-Cutter-Mortise-Tenon-Joint/32606494380.html





Have no idea how it cuts really, proably not great. It's supposed to be used on a special drilling machine.
« Last Edit: Thu, 24 May 2018, 08:36:57 by joric »