A weird idea came to me...

[Stratus Autra]

I'm currently working on an old Focus FK-5001 that I ordered a few weeks ago. I've cleaned the keyboard chassis and keycaps, and the replacement controller is currently in the mail. I'm flowcharting the programming behind a drop-in replacement chip. The only thing left for me to do is to replace the switches.

The switches in the keyboard right now are complicated SKCM White, and dust has definitely entered the switches (proven by the dust bunnies underneath the keycaps). The switches have been ruined and are very bindy and scratchy.
I've tried lubing them, and they feel a bit smoother now, but they still bind badly on off-center keypresses. My choices now are to buy replacement switches, most likely NOS yellow Alps or Matias switches. After considering some ideas, I thought up of something crazy.

You know how worn-down Cherry switches feel smoother than stock Cherry switches? What if I took out the switchplate and click leaves from the switches, and rigged a contraption that would keep pressing on just the slider, springs (not the originals, mind you), and the top and bottom housing? Would the constant rubbing smoothen the points of friction? Can one wear Alps switches down so much that they stop becoming scratchy?

I will experiment soon, and later I will come with some results. What is your opinion on this idea?

[tp4tissue]

It would be easier to create a contraption that depresses the keys for you. 

Professional machines are pneumatic,  but you can do one up that's rotary like train wheels.

This is better, because you can set it for a fixed number of actuation, and it can be quite fast.

There are only 37 to 50 keys that you use often enough to warrant breaking in. 

So if you built this device, and let it run overnight, you'd complete the break in within a month and a half.

OR if you design it to depress entire rows or even the entire key plain, you could break it in within days.



Keep in mind that while this would work in theory,  it can not create the identical wear pattern of REAL USE. In real use, everyone's hand is different, the pressure they exert is different, the ANGLE at which they attack each key is different.  Thus the specific wear pattern of each individual can not be fully replicated.   

- This wear pattern is the Magic of keyboard use..  if we stick with 1 board our whole lives, there is no way to replace it, it has been personally imprinted. The object is elevated from a mechanically generic item to an extension of ones SOUL.