As an ardent fan and user of IBM model M keyboards for over 20 years, I am delighted to find this site.
Having used inferior keyboards from time to time, I always come back to the Model M as the most delightful to type on. It's especially distressing to see a truly great product discontinued by its original manufacturer, but I'm very happy to see Unicomp keeping the tradition alive by continuing to manufacture the buckling-spring design. After purchasing both the Windows and the Mac versions of their Classic board, I'm pleased to report my general level of satisfaction with both. I should point out that I had them build my Mac board into a full-size housing, not the downsized SpaceSaver housing which I tried first, as the full-size seems heavier and more solidly constructed than the SpaceSaver.
Now I'm interested in exploring the possibility of building and possibly selling my own version of the Model M, with some changes to allow much easier servicing even though M's rarely need service; a quiet-version option which keeps the tactile/audible crispness of the buckling spring but with less key noise; an illuminated-key option; and with updated exterior styling.
To make this possible, I plan to replace the single-piece spring frame with individual keyswitch modules like on the 5576-003 and 5576-A01 made by IBM Japan. These use clips to attach to the steel plate rather than the heat-staked plastic rivets of US-produced M's and are thus easily removable and replaceable if needed.
I could use some help from this forum to track down a sample 5576 with this type of keyswitch. If anyone has available for sale a 5576-003 or -A01 (or any other IBM buckling-spring board with separate switch modules) please let me know, either on this forum or by email. I need to replicate these parts precisely to make this work; and since the buckling-spring patent has expired several years ago, it should be legally OK to do so.
I believe Sandy55 may be able to help with getting one of the 5576 boards, so Sandy if you're reading this, please let me know if you can help.
Thanks!
Mike48
P.S. If any of you wear Maui Jim PolarizedPlus2 sunglasses with their rare-earth glass lenses (i.e., not their plastic lenses), I hope you enjoy them as immensely as I do (see US Patent 6,145,984 at
www.uspto.gov)
