1) say I have a board with mx brown and I want to mod it to ergo clear, would my best/easiest option be just open up the switches and swap the stem, spring, etc?
2) are the housings universal?
1) Depends on the keyboard you have. If its plate mounted and stock or PCB mounted with LEDs you'll have to desolder the switches. If you have a custom plate that allows you to open the switches without desoldering then yes, swapping the stem and spring would be easiest. If you have a custom plate and LEDs, you'll have to desolder the LEDs. You can mod the housings to work with the custom plate and LEDs.
2) Yes
say I have a board with mx brown and I want to mod it to ergo clear, would my best/easiest option be just open up the switches and swap the stem, spring, etc?
are the housings universal?
You need the sliders from the clears and the springs from the browns, if I am not mistaken.
If you're doing the "traditional" ergo-clear mod then yes, this is correct. I think there's a bit of confusion with ergo-clears since some people, including myself, refer to anything that's not stock clears as ergo-clears. However,
the precedent is that ergo clears are Brown/Red/Blue springs with a Clear stem. And everything else should be referred to by spring weight. For example: 55g Clears or 62g Clears.