[IC] Nitwimp60 WKL Case

[nitwimp]

Hello everybody! My name is nitwimp, I am a machinist with my own equipment and this is my solo project
Here are some pictures:






Some basic info about the case:
2 piece aluminum high profile case
Top mount with brass plate
4° angle
Ansi layout
Standard 3x 1.25u - 6.25u spacebar - 4x 1.25u bottom row layout.
High profile walls (bottom of caps are not visible).
Uses Keycult Graphite PCB
Brushed aluminum finish (I would love to do in house anodizing but i cannot offer that at this time)

Pricing and manufacturing:

Price of this kit: 500$

Contents of kit: 2 piece aluminum case, brass plate, and hardware (brass plate comes standard, no additional charge)

Can order with or without PCB

Each of these cases are individually crafted by me

Production starts after group buy reaches its limit of 50, or 1 month

I estimate i can produce 1-2 complete kit a day when in full swing of production

I only have 1 milling machine and 2 hands.

Takes a solid 7-8 hours from start to finish.

I have landed on 500$ as a reasonable price point for my product. After considering all the aspects involved with producing a quality case (designing, CAM, machine setup, prototyping, streamlining the process, and all the other hurdles involved)  + manufacturing them all myself

Currently finishing up a few small tweaks and will have more photos of how it looks when assembled with a build.

More pictures to come

I am located in midwest, USA

Here is my discord https://discord.gg/yDcaKJXntb

When does the group buy start?
After i have an assembled proto and sound test video, so very soon
 

Stay tuned if interested!

Edit-2/7/21
I am now offering in house anodizing instead of the original brushed finish

[Rafa_n]

$500 why

[HoodrowThrillson]

That side screw hole(?) really ruins the side profile

[finalarcadia]

Any durability concerns with raw Alu?

I like the design. I think you gotta add some bump-on slots at the bottom

[marshskitow]

I don't know about machining and that kind of stuff, but i don't see a 500$ project. I can be wrong, the man have to pay lot of hours he is going to work ...

[geohammy]

$500 is kinda pricey

Edit: quite an interesting bottom row. It may be better to just make the case a standard 7u wkl instead of that.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[nitwimp]

That side screw hole(?) really ruins the side profile

There have been a few minor tweaks since the screen cap of the model, the bottom photo is what im going to continue doing.

[Visionaire]

Big fan of 60s and like the side cut there... but $500 is just too much.

[powwu]

Looks awesome. Looks decently hard to machine, and you've given good reasoning for your price point. With that said, there are better options for cheaper, so it might be difficult to get people on this. GLWIC

[nitwimp]

Looks awesome. Looks decently hard to machine, and you've given good reasoning for your price point. With that said, there are better options for cheaper, so it might be difficult to get people on this. GLWIC

Thank you I appreciate it.
Yea, there definitely are better options out there for the price. I know my design and mounting isnt the most intricate or original but I've got to start somewhere 

[nitwimp]

Any durability concerns with raw Alu?

I like the design. I think you gotta add some bump-on slots at the bottom

Some slots for the bottom can be incorporated

Of course raw aluminum is softer but any light scratches that occur can be sanded out with scotch bright or 400-600 grit, just dont drop it on concrete or something lol. I would avoid having other metal objects that might gouge/dent/knick the case in the event of sudden contact between the two

[Ustinj]

The board has a nice side profile, but I think the cost of machining it in house may be more of a disadvantage in this case - you could probably send this to a CNC shop and have it done for cheaper. Would like to see the final product, fully-finished as would be delivered to a buyer. Also agree with hoodrow's point above, the screw hole in the side profile kind of really is a bummer - perhaps moving that screw hole would be the best choice

[Jefff]

Interesting side profile, but the price is kinda high IMO....

[MrRare]

Bruh why is it $500.

[huey]

That bottom row is... interesting.

[hkiri]

The price and raw aluminum. No no.

[Ustinj]

That bottom row is... interesting.

oh wow i did not realize. I think probably 0.01% of people actually use this layout, and the 1.25u blockers aren't going to work with anyone wanting to use tsangan WKL - which is 99.99% of WKL users

[nitwimp]

Since the price point is unpopular, I'm going to offer to anodize them with no price increase. Anodizing them would add some time to the manufacturing process though.

[heyimpanda]

yeah that bottom row is quite interesting, i mean i guess it's something that hasn't really been done before, but it breaks the symmetry of WKL bottom rows that i feel like many people use WKL for

[nitwimp]

That bottom row is... interesting.

oh wow i did not realize. I think probably 0.01% of people actually use this layout, and the 1.25u blockers aren't going to work with anyone wanting to use tsangan WKL - which is 99.99% of WKL users

I plan on doing a tsangan variation in the future

[Tree_]

Looks wise I think it's great, but everything else mentioned previously makes this a hard sell.

Another thing I'd point out is that if you're already at $500, I can only imagine the cost to ship this outside of the US is going to be quite inhibitive for anyone that wants to buy from outside of the US. Based on current conversion rates I don't see this as a $800~AUD keyboard, but maybe others do.

[Nuclear Nachos]

this looks really cool and interesting, really like the side and overall profile. What other info such as front height can you tell us? The price is a little steep like others said and the 6.25u wkl is neat i'd still prefer 7u, and maybe look at aluminum/pc/fr4 plates instead of brass to see if that can decrease the cost a little (and i'd rather have a alu or other materials than brass normally
edit: also agree with hoodrow with the point about the screw hole, would be nice to have the screw holes on the bottom instead of the curve

[wencan008]

Interesting project idea and I'd like to see this succeed. I do want to echo the points everyone else has brought up, mainly the WKL ANSI being a strange choice, and the screwhole in the side profile

[nitwimp]

I appreciate all of the feed back, I understand tsangan is more popular and i would like to offer that ASAP. I designed this case with this bottom row because I do not own any caps that support tsangan, and I thought maybe I'm not the only one and decided to go ahead with this project.

As for the screw holes along the side, ill leave them off and see if it changes anything ( I doubt it will )

I'm sorry my original asking price is a huge turn off, but I still feel it is fairly reasonable given the amount of work I will put into these

I can definitely look into using other plate material besides brass to recalibrate my asking price.

I still am willing to anodize these at no extra cost. (getting them shipped will take longer, that is the only downside)

Thanks everybody

[Visionaire]

(removed)

[Zeelobby]

Yeah... This seems like a cool self project, but the price just isn't going to get people into this. The fact that your throwing in anno for free already leads me to believe you already had healthy margins on this to give in so easily. Lack of PCB is also pretty ridiculous for something that costs this much.

I'm all for personal passion projects, but I'm not sure the effort to bring this board to market is really worth it for you or others. Ignoring the normal red flags of a first time runner, I just see more flags down the road.

[nitwimp]

Yeah... This seems like a cool self project, but the price just isn't going to get people into this. The fact that your throwing in anno for free already leads me to believe you already had healthy margins on this to give in so easily. Lack of PCB is also pretty ridiculous for something that costs this much.

I'm all for personal passion projects, but I'm not sure the effort to bring this board to market is really worth it for you or others. Ignoring the normal red flags of a first time runner, I just see more flags down the road.

Sorry you have interpreted my offer of anodizing as a red flag, to be more specific i was going to buy the required materials to do it in house.
Im sorry if you think ill be profiting off my work too much, I arrived at that asking price via alot of different considerations.
 

[Bamboo238]

I like the design, and the curved sides are nice. But I agree that I would be very hesitant dropping $500 on a new groupbuy runner. Especially given that you only registered your account yesterday.

[zombie2life]

$500 why

Probably because of the limited number of production units (50 Units).

[clonetropboi]

He literally said why it is $500, this is a limited run and doing that much work yourself is not easy, so it is priced accordingly.

[Rafa_n]

He literally said why it is $500, this is a limited run and doing that much work yourself is not easy, so it is priced accordingly.

if you think this is priced accordingly then you don't know **** about this hobby

[clonetropboi]

He literally said why it is $500, this is a limited run and doing that much work yourself is not easy, so it is priced accordingly.

if you think this is priced accordingly then you don't know **** about this hobby

A lot of other people who run GBs don't have CNC Machines.

[geohammy]

He literally said why it is $500, this is a limited run and doing that much work yourself is not easy, so it is priced accordingly.

Why would anyone pay $500 for this though? Just because he's doing it all himself doesn't make it worth it to me. Especially with the weird bottom row layout.

[Rafa_n]

He literally said why it is $500, this is a limited run and doing that much work yourself is not easy, so it is priced accordingly.

if you think this is priced accordingly then you don't know **** about this hobby

A lot of other people who run GBs don't have CNC Machines.

That sentence kind of ruins your first point.

[Senbeii]

50 MOQ, Priced at $500 seems about right especially if you're doing it in-house. Tho everything will be up to you, I hope you'll be able to produce something high quality 

[Paitupai]

Side profile looking good, but the screw hole kinda ruining it, probably will look much better if you can move them and have clean side profile.

The price it too high for me tho and it is also without a pcb (add another $65 for the graphite pcb). Might want to try and strike a balance between the price that is worth for you and the buyer.

GLWIC!

[Nerdbot5000]

He literally said why it is $500, this is a limited run and doing that much work yourself is not easy, so it is priced accordingly.

if you think this is priced accordingly then you don't know **** about this hobby

And you don't know **** about economies of scale. One guy with a CNC can never produce a product as cheaply as a factory designed to make that product. He's explained his situation and he gets to set the price of his time, expenses, and labor, and I think it's reasonable. $500 is too much for many, but when people are paying 1k for used products on mechmarket, he's going to find buyers. It's probably better for him to set a higher price and get fewer orders than the other way around.

I don't have a horse in this race, but I do enjoy that it's a unique design. I think the brushed finish (rather than ano) is more interesting and probably harder for factories to replicate well, so it may stay unique. I also like that you've designed an interesting layout that can use standard ansi keycaps (and smaller spacebars generally sound better). Granted, someone who buys a $500 case probably doesn't care much about keycaps that don't offer more than ansi compatibility.

[chicagoboss25]

CNC machining is typically billed by hour, so given a 7-8 hour milling time I can see how he got to a $500 price. Low end machines are $30-40/hour and higher end can be $100+/hour.

HOWEVER, I would guess that most high end keyboards don't take 7-8 hours to machine. I ran the Modern M0110 GB and it was a 2-3 hour machine time on a large/high-end 3-axis with an extra 4th axis.

You can probably bring the cost down a lot by 1) optimizing the tool paths, 2) running the project on another machine with more axes, 3) outsourcing to China with lower hourly cost, or some combination of the three

[nitwimp]

CNC machining is typically billed by hour, so given a 7-8 hour milling time I can see how he got to a $500 price. Low end machines are $30-40/hour and higher end can be $100+/hour.

HOWEVER, I would guess that most high end keyboards don't take 7-8 hours to machine. I ran the Modern M0110 GB and it was a 2-3 hour machine time on a large/high-end 3-axis with an extra 4th axis.

You can probably bring the cost down a lot by 1) optimizing the tool paths, 2) running the project on another machine with more axes, 3) outsourcing to China with lower hourly cost, or some combination of the three

Unfortunately I do not have a 4th axis attachment at this time. Tool paths will get more optimized as I go, and the est time of 7-8hr includes finishing and stock prep, not exclusively spindle run time

[nasp]

Please consider a less expensive plate material. Brass might look nice but there are other materials that are much cheaper that border the same if not better trying experience.

[Segneri]

I'm never gonna be rude to new designers in this  KB scene but you do need to seriously take a step back and really look at the criticism in this post. We aren't trying to hate or discourage you to make it but we want the best product from you.
Its a good V1 but if  you want this to be a $500 board it needs more work. Take it back to drawing board and work on it. Good luck friend Cant wait to see a V2.

[nitwimp]

I'm never gonna be rude to new designers in this  KB scene but you do need to seriously take a step back and really look at the criticism in this post. We aren't trying to hate or discourage you to make it but we want the best product from you.
Its a good V1 but if  you want this to be a $500 board it needs more work. Take it back to drawing board and work on it. Good luck friend Cant wait to see a V2.

Revising my work is never ending I can say that much, always trying to improve. I'm currently tweaking my model based on the feed back I've received from this IC.

Since this is my design and I'm the only chef in the kitchen, it's not incredibly difficult to modify small details such as removing the hole on the cutouts