Getting switches straight?

[pixelpusher]

After building several keyboards, I've started getting pickier about my builds.  Do you guys have any tricks for getting plate mounted switches in straight?  I'm sure you've noticed that positioning plates give a little wiggle room to rotate the switch a degree or two.  Up until now I've tried my best to just eyeball it.  Then, once the board is done, I put some keycaps on it to check gaps.  If any look a bit crooked I'll take a soldering iron to the thick pin while twisting the switch from the front.

PCB mounted switches are so much better for me because of this.  Even when using a plate, the extra pins on the PCB mount switches make alignment a non-issue.  Everything is perfectly straight.

So, anyone have a trick for perfectly straight plate mounted switches?

[merlin64]

Have you tried soldering the switches in the four corners first. Do them in this order: Top left, bottom right, top right, bottom left? If those are done properly, than the rest of the switches should follow.

If it's still hard, I would suggest doing PCB mount switches for those four corners. If possible I try to always buy PCB mount switches as converting them to plate mount is just a matter of snipping those two extra legs.