[IC] 60% AEKII & AT101W Plates

[emdude]

Sorry, I asked this a little while ago and I'm not sure if you saw the message or if you have already considered this option, but maybe laser cutting would be a cheaper option?

Thanks a bunch for the update though, we really appreciate the time you're putting into this.

[rand77]

Sorry, I asked this a little while ago and I'm not sure if you saw the message or if you have already considered this option, but maybe laser cutting would be a cheaper option?

Thanks a bunch for the update though, we really appreciate the time you're putting into this.

+1

Appreciate all the efforts.   Some shops are able to laser cut stainless steel (high powered laser) as emdude mentioned, I think this might be something to look into.

[fuzzycuffs]

Definitely interested.  I have a PCB from hasu but no plate.

Would prefer Dell layout, since I have some Tai Hao caps already to use.

[harlw]

def interested!

[brighenne]

I'd be in for an AEK plate and PCB.

[tintoret]

If you can't find a suitable local place, it might be worth looking into bigbluesaw or lasergist or something similar.

[Pyrelink]

If it helps, I would very much be interested in purchasing a HHKB and/or an Infinity Hacker plate.

[phoible]

EMDude found a place in LA that does Laser Cutting for a reasonable price. I'm going to look into that.

[Radlife]

Are you using JDCarpe's plate design or your own? Cause I wouldn't mind pitching in for jd's plates.

[emdude]

Phoible will license JD's plate files after he hopefully works out a price with the machine shop!

[lootbag]

Do not mean to hijack this IC thread but just thought I would make a post because I am getting a few 60% ALPS plates cut for me.
I am located in Hong Kong and found a place in Shenzhen who quoted me some decent prices.

1 plate = 80 yuan
10 plates = 40 yuan each
50 plates = 35 yuan each

I think I will get a single plate first and see the quality, this is for 304 stainless steel, 1.3mm thickness.

Just thought I would throw it out there and see if you guys want me to proxy the plates over to the US.
I do not have time to ship multiple orders, I would just ship to a single person and they can then redistribute.
Probably cheaper than way anyways.

[emdude]

Wow, that is incredibly cheap!  I think it would not be a bad idea for OP to look into this as well, prices should be very good even if overseas shipping is factored in.

Please let us know how your prototype goes!

[lootbag]

Or maybe you guys can order direct from the Taobao seller haha.

By the way, is 1.3mm an acceptable thickness?
I read the ALPS spec sheet, says 1.0-1.2mm for plate thickness.
What is the thickest I can go while still having the switches click into place?

[emdude]

I have read that 16 gauge (about 1.6 mm) is actually too thick for the switches to clip into place, so slightly thinner is probably better.  I'm not sure how thick the plate can go for the switches to fit comfortably though.

I think this will still need to be a GB because the proper plate designs need to be licensed from JDCarpe.

[kiwi99]

Or maybe you guys can order direct from the Taobao seller haha.

By the way, is 1.3mm an acceptable thickness?
I read the ALPS spec sheet, says 1.0-1.2mm for plate thickness.
What is the thickest I can go while still having the switches click into place?

my alps plate I made comes to 1.35mm with the powder coating and the switches snap in fine in both my clueboard and alps64 boards.

I have read that 16 gauge (about 1.6 mm) is actually too thick for the switches to clip into place, so slightly thinner is probably better.  I'm not sure how thick the plate can go for the switches to fit comfortably though.

I think this will still need to be a GB because the proper plate designs need to be licensed from JDCarpe.

Yea I wouldn't suggest more than 1.3mm mines pushing it.

[need]

I think 1.3mm is OK.

[muon]

I'm in for a AEKII plate

[E3E]

If you could make an HHKB-style plate in either 6 - 7 u. I'd be down.

[infodroid]

Okay, great.  I'd be down for 2 AT101 plates myself.

Did you manage to get the CAD files from JDCarpe?

I PM'd JD about it cause I also wanted to get my own plates. He said that since the only way he earns anything is from his designs, and has a blanket policy of to deny requests like that. He did show me how to make my own alps plate design with builder.swllkb.com which has all you need

Wow, I e-mailed JDCarpe about getting the files as well and haven't gotten a response, I guess that's why.  BlueNalgene said after his GB that one would be able to ask JD for the files as long as it was for a one-off or a non-profit GB..

Anyhow, I think having his CAD files would be ideal because SwillKB's plate designer doesn't seem to fully support Alps..

Like so, JDCarpe/BlueNalgene's AT101 plate:

Show Image

versus the one I made with SwillKB's editor:

Show Image

Note that it does not have the necessary holes for the spacebar stabilizer, has extra stabilizer cutouts, etc.  Perhaps someone knows how to fix these in some CAD program?

It does appear that the extra holes were simply hand-drawn in...

Swills tool uses Costar stabs for the spacebar and Alps stabs for the rest.

What about using Input Club's open source plate CADs from the Infinity 60% as a starting point?

https://github.com/kiibohd/case

[phoible]

Just wanted to provide an update. With a lot of help from Emdude, I managed to get in touch with a place in LA who can make the plates for a great price (in 304 stainless). I think pricing should be comparable to the ALPS party GB. MOQ isn't super high, meaning that it won't be hard to get enough orders to make this happen.

I reached out to JDCarpe, and hopefully we will be able license his plate design.

I think I'm only going to do AEKII plates this time around because most of the interest has been for that, and it will be simpler to do just one design rather than trying to do a whole bunch. I'm a noob at this, and would love to crush it the first time around and do something more complicated later.

Hoping to get this show on the road pretty soon!

[gnmar2723]

I just found out about this today and have an AEK II on the way from mechmarket so I'm definitely interested!

[SirFelion]

I've been interested in building a 60% ALPS as well. Do you think you could manage to get plates shipped to Japan? I'd love to get my hands on at least one plate, but could do proxy shipping as well if others on this side of the planet are interested.

[Wingpad]

I have one of hasu's PCBs on the way but no plate so I would be interested in a 60% AEKII plate.

[emdude]

Just wanted to provide an update. With a lot of help from Emdude, I managed to get in touch with a place in LA who can make the plates for a great price (in 304 stainless). I think pricing should be comparable to the ALPS party GB. MOQ isn't super high, meaning that it won't be hard to get enough orders to make this happen.

I reached out to JDCarpe, and hopefully we will be able license his plate design.

I think I'm only going to do AEKII plates this time around because most of the interest has been for that, and it will be simpler to do just one design rather than trying to do a whole bunch. I'm a noob at this, and would love to crush it the first time around and do something more complicated later.

Hoping to get this show on the road pretty soon!

If it all possible, could you still include at least the AT101W and AT101 plates?  Those and the AEK plates seem to be the most wanted and I still would really like to get an AT101 plate myself.. 

I understand if you still wish to keep things simple and just have AEK plates done, I'll certainly get one of those in any case.

[need]

Yeah I agree, adding the At101 / 102w option shouldn't be any more difficult.

[Radlife]

I know I'd be in the minority but I wouldn't get an AEKII plate, only interested in the AT101W plate.

[merlin64]

FYI, I've been trying to do this GB since January. I gave up and ran the Octagon V2 Metal Insert instead.

JDCarpe has been super busy. I shoot him an email once every month or two and it's always "I'll draft up the royalty agreements for you". Last communication with him was a few weeks ago and I'm still waiting.

[need]

FYI, I've been trying to do this GB since January. I gave up and ran the Octagon V2 Metal Insert instead.

JDCarpe has been super busy. I shoot him an email once every month or two and it's always "I'll draft up the royalty agreements for you". Last communication with him was a few weeks ago and I'm still waiting.

[emdude]

I've been looking into other resources, hopefully this is only a minor setback.

[kiwi99]

updated my aek60 plate a bit if anyone wants to use it

[Wingpad]

updated my aek60 plate a bit if anyone wants to use it

Well the good news for me is that mine lines up pretty closely with yours, maybe that means there is still hope for mine, I think I am at worst ~0.4 mm off which should be acceptable. I am assuming that since you're uploading this you've tested it before?

[need]

updated my aek60 plate a bit if anyone wants to use it

AEKII can use this as well right?

[kiwi99]

updated my aek60 plate a bit if anyone wants to use it

AEKII can use this as well right?

yea aekii layout

updated my aek60 plate a bit if anyone wants to use it

Well the good news for me is that mine lines up pretty closely with yours, maybe that means there is still hope for mine, I think I am at worst ~0.4 mm off which should be acceptable. I am assuming that since you're uploading this you've tested it before?

this is a mix between a generated plate from swills plate tool and the monarch keyboards plate which uses an aek layout and works. I cutout my own plate using a very similar design and changed some stuff I thought were needed when I built mine.. took out the hole between G&H because alps switches so wide screw wont fit between them so its pointless, made the other mounting holes a bit bigger since the screw holes were a bit off on my case, removed caps lock stabilizer holes because I think they're pointless (aekii capslock has an option to use a stab but doesnt use it on their own board.. weird), and kept costar support for the stab because why not.  I think I'll edit it soon for some more bottom row options and like split backspace if anyone is interested.

[Radlife]

Are there any updates to be had? And any chance AT101W plates will be run? I could just buy a Taihao doubleshot alps keyset instead of trying to look for a decent condition AEKII keyset and be done with it.

[PriusProblems]

Has anyone else expressed interest in a 60% ISO AEKII plate?

[Wingpad]

Has anyone else expressed interest in a 60% ISO AEKII plate?

I think you're the first.

Are there any updates to be had? And any chance AT101W plates will be run? I could just buy a Taihao doubleshot alps keyset instead of trying to look for a decent condition AEKII keyset and be done with it.

We're still waiting for the prototypes to come in and I am not sure if we're running an AT101W plate.

I had a pretty easy time finding AEKII keycaps, the hardest thing is the spacebar but that can be retr0brighted fairly easily. Plus, the Taihao double-shoot keycaps aren't exactly compatible with the AT101W. They don't have a stepped capslock and they use costar-style stabilizers for the spacebar (whereas the AT101W uses Alps-style).

[emdude]

Are there any updates to be had? And any chance AT101W plates will be run? I could just buy a Taihao doubleshot alps keyset instead of trying to look for a decent condition AEKII keyset and be done with it.

If you want, I can throw together a plate that supports TaiHao's double-shot key caps with non-stepped caps lock, costar stabs, etc.  You would have to get the plate made yourself though.

[Wingpad]

If you want, I can throw together a plate that supports TaiHao's double-shot key caps with non-stepped caps lock, costar stabs, etc.  You would have to get the plate made yourself though.

The Tai-Hao keycaps only have costar stabs for the spacebar and the rest are Alps-style, it would be really easy to generate this layout with Swill's tool since that's the default option for Alps-mount stabs.

[emdude]

You are right, but Swill's plate builder actually does generate proper Alps-style stabilizers for 6.25u space bars so they'd have to be replaced with Costar stabs.

[MandrewDavis]

I already have one of Hasu's PCBs, but I am definitely interested in an AEK plate.

[fuzzycuffs]

Definitely in for a 60% AT101W plate.

[duynguyenle]

Are there any updates to be had? And any chance AT101W plates will be run? I could just buy a Taihao doubleshot alps keyset instead of trying to look for a decent condition AEKII keyset and be done with it.

If you want, I can throw together a plate that supports TaiHao's double-shot key caps with non-stepped caps lock, costar stabs, etc.  You would have to get the plate made yourself though.

I would be very grateful if you could make the plate files and share it with us, so we could try and make the plates ourselves! 

[kato]

Has anyone else expressed interest in a 60% ISO AEKII plate?

yes! this would be nice really hard to get AEKII ISO stuff.
would buy!

[emdude]

Are there any updates to be had? And any chance AT101W plates will be run? I could just buy a Taihao doubleshot alps keyset instead of trying to look for a decent condition AEKII keyset and be done with it.

If you want, I can throw together a plate that supports TaiHao's double-shot key caps with non-stepped caps lock, costar stabs, etc.  You would have to get the plate made yourself though.

I would be very grateful if you could make the plate files and share it with us, so we could try and make the plates ourselves! 

Sure, I'll be busy for a few days, but I will try to get one made as soon as possible.

[Scarpia]

Bumping for AEKII plates

[ipreferpie]

Any chance you'd do infinity plates as well? I'm in HK myself too

[duynguyenle]

Any chance you'd do infinity plates as well? I'm in HK myself too

What would be the difference between an AT101 plate layout and an Infinity layout? I haven't come across that one before.

I have sent out a quote to a local laser fab company and waiting to hear back. It was mostly for myself since I'm cutting some Cherry MX and AEK plates. If people are keen, I could make a few extras (waiting to get prices first)

[ipreferpie]

Any chance you'd do infinity plates as well? I'm in HK myself too

What would be the difference between an AT101 plate layout and an Infinity layout? I haven't come across that one before.

I have sent out a quote to a local laser fab company and waiting to hear back. It was mostly for myself since I'm cutting some Cherry MX and AEK plates. If people are keen, I could make a few extras (waiting to get prices first)

The Infinity layout allows for split backspace and split right shift. With the Alpine Winter set, it's a very useful combo. Is only aluminum and steel doable? Would carbon fiber be an option too?

[duynguyenle]

I'm not really looking into CFRP plates, I don't think it brings anything to the table really, at least not for this particular application (also the shop I've been talking with only does stainless steel and various grades of aly)

I'm looking at either stainless or 6082 alu.

[morffius]

I am interested in a AEKII plate! I have one and just procured some Blues and want to make another. I am thinking of doing a Apple ADB Keyboard though.