CM Storm Modded to Lubed Vintage Blacks

[allanp83]

I bought a brand new CM Storm with cherry blue switches for $64.00 shipped and thanks to DangWang I was able to acquire a vintage WYSE  keyboard with black switches.  I decided to mod the CM Storm and replace the blues with blacks.  My first mechanical keyboard was a Filco TKL with black switches and honestly I wasn't a big fan of the blacks but after experimenting with the vintage blacks on the WYSE at the Chicago Meetup and reading up on MagicMeatball's lubrication guide, I thought it would be a neat project to work on.  In all it took me about 8 hours to do everything and I gotta say I'm glad I did it.  The keys feel much nicer than the blacks on the Filco, which could be because the switches are lubed or vintage or a combination of both.

I planned on taking some pics of the whole process and posting a worklog or something but I don't have a decent camera to work with.  I also plan on installing the blue switches off the CM Storm into a poker and modding them with oiled 62g springs.  If anyone's interested I'll try to take pics of that whole process.

Anyway enough typing...and onto the pics!





Special thanks to DangWang for taking the pics and allowing me to use some of your skulls lol.  Also thanks to MagicMeatball for writing up the lubrication guide.  It was a huge help!

[DanGWanG]

Hey nice pictures.  Looks like my floor!

[sth]

wyse looks great on that board.

[cgbuen]

Keycaps look like they came from a couple of different models.. is that right? Gray on gray looks great.

[WhiteFireDragon]

At a first glance, it blew my mind how you only had 2 posts and already owned some really rare CC's. But then after actually reading, those were actually Dan's haha.

Welcome to GH. Worklog would be nice. Many custom PC builds have worklogs, especially the watercooling ones. We need more worklogs here at GH.

[MMB]

Nice! Glad you liked the lube guide

The WYSE look really nice on that kb.

[DanGWanG]

At a first glance, it blew my mind how you only had 2 posts and already owned some really rare CC's. But then after actually reading, those were actually Dan's haha.

Welcome to GH. Worklog would be nice. Many custom PC builds have worklogs, especially the watercooling ones. We need more worklogs here at GH.

This guy went through all my CCs and was like yoooo let me use this one for pics...

[dorkvader]

At a first glance, it blew my mind how you only had 2 posts and already owned some really rare CC's. But then after actually reading, those were actually Dan's haha.

Welcome to GH. Worklog would be nice. Many custom PC builds have worklogs, especially the watercooling ones. We need more worklogs here at GH.

Took a bunch of pictures (with my cellphone, was still waiting for my camera to arrive) of my Bolt-mod. I didn't know people (other than me) were interested in that sort of thing. I'll post them if I remember.

That said, I'm interested in your work log. I'm considering lubing the switches on my WY30 keyboard to see if they'll get any better. I want to use it as a portable. It's like a poker with a tenkey. (AKA Perfect). Where does one get springs? I want some lighter ones to modify all my vintage blacks to ghetto reds, make ergo clears, etc.

[allanp83]

Thanks guys for the compliments.  It was a surprise for me too when I put on the wyse keycaps on the board.  I didn't realize how nice it turned out especially with the dark grey keys matching the case. 

I'll definitely take pics as I mod the poker.  As far as where to find springs, I was told they're very hard to find.  Dan showed me his big collection of springs while I was over there.  I was trying to work out a deal with him on getting some 62g springs.

And yes, all those CCs belong to Dan except for the blue one on the escape key which belongs to me now (thanks dan).  He was hesitant in letting me use them for pics but once they were on he got weirdly excited to take pics of the keyboard with his CC's lol.

[tp4tissue]

mmmmm.. lube... mmm... aww yea!

[hashbaz]

wyse looks great on that board.

Agree.  Normally I don't really like the Wyse sets, but this is perfect.

[dorkvader]

I'm not sure if that was from my Wyse but if it is I'm glad someone is getting some use out of it.

Someone went on a rampage and bought all the 900866's on Taobao...

You don't need PS2! Get a 840358 and steal the keycaps out of it like I did.

I didn't think WYSE looked that great on mine, but I suspect it needs another few weeks of retrobriting. Your pictures look really good.

Unfortunately, it's no longer allowed for me to concentrate dangerous chemicals (like H2O2) over the stove. I told my Landlord that I'm careful, but for some reason he doesn't trust me anymore where science is concerned.

[kaiserreich]

I'm not sure if that was from my Wyse but if it is I'm glad someone is getting some use out of it.

Someone went on a rampage and bought all the 900866's on Taobao...

The ones that looks new were there since last November/December.
I bought 2 of them. 1 came in perfect, the other had some damage on the keycaps, but overall, they look and smell like brand new electronics.
I know a guy who bought a lot more.

These vintage blacks with the plate mounted cherry style stabilizer are wonderful.