Topre Realforce - rusting plate

[heretyk]

It's been exactly 5 years since I bought this keyboard secondhand. It cost me a lot of money, but I liked it, and it immediately became my fav keyboard and daily driver. Always kept dry and never spilled anything on it. Today I discovered that despite my careful handling, it started to rust!

Do all Topre keyboards suffer from this issue? Could you check yours or maybe provide some photos for comparison?

(These tiny spots are not dirt. It's oxidation.)

[Signature]

I think its fairly common, I have some oxidation spots on mine aswell. There is a cad file for making your own plate on github if you would be interested in that. Otherwise I think its mostly just aesthetically displeasing, shouldnt affect the feeling too much.

Link to Plate thread with github repo: https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=97096.msg3063333#msg3063333

[Riverman]

That's the problem with a bare steel plate. I've had a couple of Topre keyboards where the plate rusted.  I got ambitious with one and dissembled the entire keyboard, sanded the rust off, and painted the plate with black automotive trim paint.  It looked great afterwards, but that was a lot of work.