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geekhack Community => Keyboard Keycaps => Topic started by: Sniping on Sat, 20 July 2013, 14:11:13
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I just bought an old electronic typewriter at a garage sale this morning and I'm not sure what kind of keycaps these are. I may try to see if I can fit some of these onto my Topre with some shaving, but the caps look pretty thick so I'm curious as to what these are made of.
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You can test them a couple of different ways to see what they are: http://imgur.com/a/fAi8I
I'd guess ABS, but I could be wrong. As for what they are, I'm sure it's some proprietary cap mount.
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some awesome quality caps there, they don't make them like this anymore....
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Since it's tripleshot, I would strongly suspect ABS
Nice find, there aren't too many known tripleshot keycaps out there.
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Can we see the other sides? Maybe they would be cool on a Topre, in which case you could send them here...
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I've never seen a stem like that. It kinda looks like topre, but I doubt it is
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The stem is actually very similar to Topre, and if there was a cut on the top of the stem as well as the bottom, then it should fit with a Topre because the switches these caps came off of also have the stem of the keycap on the inside like Topre, and are similar in size as well. The profiling on the keycaps are also very odd because they're semi-low profile but look like they should fit OK if they were put on a Topre board. Here's a picture of the front of the caps, I put the enter key in that picture because the back of it looks pretty crazy.
Edit: You can't really see it in the picture but the green stem on the enter key is twice the height of the cap.
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So, another update. I tried cutting the stems of two keys (The "1" key and "," key) and I ended up screwing both those stems up for keyboard science. The shape looked right but when I put it on the board it was waaaay too loose. Then, right AFTER, I found out that these caps just fit right onto my Leopold FC660C without any modification at all. Like I said in the previous post, these caps were semi-low profile, but they actually don't really look shorter than the stock keycaps. The biggest thing though is the feel with these keycaps, these caps give it a VERY tactile feel. They feel stiffer than stock keycaps and the bump is accentuated. At the very top of the switch you can notice that these are a whole lot stiffer than stock caps, and the bump is more pronounced, and I think this is due to the profile of the keycaps. The caps have slightly varied heights, but it looks like this is caused by inconsistencies in the stems of the Topre stem itself. My "h" and "," caps are lower than the rest of the keycaps on my particular board, and at first I was getting a repeating key for both those letters, but I adjusted the fit of the "h" key and it seems to work perfectly now, though I still sometimes get a repeating key with "," but for normal use (Pressing it once, and not trying purposely to get the key to repeat) it seems to do just fine. I wouldn't say that these caps make the board thock more, because it's probably just placebo, but the extra tactility and bump is definitely not.
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Oh wow. Easily the best topre keycaps you can get. Triple shots..
Any idea what kinds of switches the typewriter uses?
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Wait for it....wait for it....
rubber dome
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Oh hahah, nice keys you got there :3
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I don't think they will fit on the Topre, Topre caps have a little catch on them, or if they do they will be loose as hell.
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How much do you want for those!? Or can you point me in the direction of where they came from? I LOVE ABS caps, and that looks like Cherry font. Would be amazing on a Topre board, to try to remind me that I belong to Cherry MY, even if I'm slumming it on other switches.
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How much do you want for those!? Or can you point me in the direction of where they came from? I LOVE ABS caps, and that looks like Cherry font. Would be amazing on a Topre board, to try to remind me that I belong to Cherry MY, even if I'm slumming it on other switches.
I'm planning to auction these off in a few day to raise some money so I can get an ErgoDox eventually.
@insilica These fit pretty well on Topre considering they weren't even made for Topre switches.
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How much do you want for those!? Or can you point me in the direction of where they came from? I LOVE ABS caps, and that looks like Cherry font. Would be amazing on a Topre board, to try to remind me that I belong to Cherry MY, even if I'm slumming it on other switches.
I'm planning to auction these off in a few day to raise some money so I can get an ErgoDox eventually.
@insilica These fit pretty well on Topre considering they weren't even made for Topre switches.
What brand of typewriter was it? Model would be nice too :))
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Brother AX26, I couldn't find anything about it on the interwebz though.
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Brother AX26, I couldn't find anything about it on the interwebz though.
Yeah, all I could find was ribbon cartridges :/
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Brother AX26, I couldn't find anything about it on the interwebz though.
Yeah, all I could find was ribbon cartridges :/
I didn't try too hard or too long but I concur...
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Brother AX26, I couldn't find anything about it on the interwebz though.
Yeah, all I could find was ribbon cartridges :/
I didn't try too hard or too long but I concur...
Guess it's time to bug every eBay seller to take a cap off and send me a pic :))
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Brother AX26, I couldn't find anything about it on the interwebz though.
Yeah, all I could find was ribbon cartridges :/
I didn't try too hard or too long but I concur...
Guess it's time to bug every eBay seller to take a cap off and send me a pic :))
I've learned you'd be surprised what some sellers will do, you might even get lucky.
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@insilica These fit pretty well on Topre considering they weren't even made for Topre switches.
How very interesting. Will keep an eye for these on fleabay or if they should show their faces on the classifieds :))
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So Topre doubleshots actually technically exist!!? Awesome!
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So Topre doubleshots actually technically exist!!? Awesome!
They're technically not Topre, but they fit! And they're actually tripleshots!
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I've waited my whole life for this! Now I just need a Realforce. :p
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I've waited my whole life for this! Now I just need a Realforce. :p
Your life isn't complete until you own at least 3x Topre's!
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Couldn't find much on the AX-26 either, but I see there are a lot of models, AX-20, 25, etc.
this one looks to have similar keys, for starters
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Vintage-Brother-AX-20-Word-Spell-Dictionary-Electronic-Typewriter-Tested-Working-/380655894142?pt=Vintage_Electronics_R2&hash=item58a0dbfe7e