I nominate
TheGlyph for both impacting my life in a positive way AND doing something positive for the community.
It was a cold Friday morning on December 8, 2017 when I was chatting with TheGlyph who I had just met at the Bay Area meetup at Nest Headquarters the previous month on November 11th. We were both building our skills as artisan keycap makers, practicing and developing our casting workflows, and learning as much as we could about the process.
Like many people, I was making Lego mold boxes with clay platforms, which was working, but wasn't ideal. I couldn't easily make lots of molds that all had interchangeable parts days apart because if anything changed in my setups, the parts wouldn't mate properly. So on this cold December morning, I showed TheGlyph my Lego setup.
Fig 1. Legos with Clay"Doesn't seem ideal" was the reply, and I agreed. It was the best solution I could come up with having access to only Legos and Sculpey clay. After some back and forth problem solving, it was decided that a platform that interfaces with the Legos on the bottom, and has an MX stem on the top would be very useful. That was 11:39am. An hour and 40 minutes later, TheGlyph was sending me screenshots of a platform that would serve my needs. He generously 3D printed a few, what I jokingly was calling, "Lego Adapter System For Pro Moldmaking" (LASfPM for short), and tossed 'em in the mail to me.
Wednesday rolled around and when I got home from work I had received a tiny package that I wasn't expecting. I didn't recognize the return address and I hadn't sunk any money into artisans or other small items that I could remember in the weeks previous. Without hesitation, I cracked the white craft box open with incredible speed. Inside were a few LASfPM loosely cradled in bubble wrap. I snatched them up and was off to my casting station. I plugged a single platform onto my Lego baseplate, and like some sort of magic trick, the 3D printed piece clung on like an official Lego block. I slapped a DSA blank onto the top MX cruciform, tossed a Lego wall around the platform, and slathered it with silicone.
And then I waited.
Once the silicone cured, I demolded and was amazed at the clean cavity it had produced. I was now able to make an endless supply of top and bottom mold parts that could all be used interchangeably. An incredible victory that improved my workflow tenfold. And we all lived happily ever after.
Or did we?
This was great for me, but what about all the other artisans stuck with Lego mold boxes lined with clay?
I continued using this technology, and TheGlyph used my input and his own engineering prowess to tweak and tune the adapters. 6 months went by as the adapters were shortened and the keying corner was improved and multiple print tests were run. They evolved until they were ready for public consumption.
On Jul 23, 2018 TheGlyph unveiled the newly named "L2K" system to the community. L2Ks were an extremely low-cost way for people to upgrade their existing Lego box molds and achieve high quality and repeatable results. This resulted in new artisans being able to eliminate some of the tedious mold making from their routine and let them focus learning the rest of the workflow knowing that their silicone molds would be consistant. A new "Casting" channel was formed in the r/mk Discord and artisans had a place to talk about techniques, share tips, and support each other's craft. A new generation of makers has since sprouted up and the maker side of our Keyboard community is growing faster now than ever before.
