Custom "Mantis Keyboard" (name pending)

[VVhitel2abbit]

Howdy!

I am building a custom 47-key keyboard. I have been through close to 30 different designs now and am feeling real close to the one I am going to build.

Here is a 3D view of it (notice the 3 bottom keys are a full key-height down from the others. Now both thumbs have something to do!):


And here is the layout:


If you want to know the specifics of how things are going to work and why I did what I did, go to my blog. Here is a link to its "table of contents" page:
http://tomorrowlabs.blogspot.com/p/buil ... board.html

Thanks, and if you have any feedback, I would love to hear it. Also, if you want any of my vector graphics or 3-D files, let me know. I am also programming an android version of the keyboard so I can learn to use it easier (that's how I learned dvorak. I plan to switch to Colemak for this one, though.)

[topoly]

Looks like this is shaping up nicely.

I think I can offer just my $.02 for the top plate construction. My thought after making mine out of 1.5mm acrylic was that it was too flexible and I should have provided more support throughout the middle of the case to prevent that. Now I have solder joints that bend and pop off about once a month or so. Repairing those is getting kind of frustrating.

Now, I know you have some thick acrylic that should help buffer that, but just keep it in mind... obviously, stainless steel like some of our colleagues use is way too expensive on the small scale.

Hope that helps at least a little! Looks like a great project.

[VVhitel2abbit]

Looks like this is shaping up nicely.

I think I can offer just my $.02 for the top plate construction. My thought after making mine out of 1.5mm acrylic was that it was too flexible and I should have provided more support throughout the middle of the case to prevent that. Now I have solder joints that bend and pop off about once a month or so. Repairing those is getting kind of frustrating.

Now, I know you have some thick acrylic that should help buffer that, but just keep it in mind... obviously, stainless steel like some of our colleagues use is way too expensive on the small scale.

Hope that helps at least a little! Looks like a great project.

Yeah, thanks. I was wondering how bendy it would be. My plan is to have the thick layer under the 1.5mm one be support as well (since the two layer design still leaves room for wires.) I also have a kickstarter 3D printer coming in December that I plan to make mk2 with. It is nice to find a forum with other wierd folks like me. I assumed for years that I was alone in wanting to make my own keyboard till I finally googled for tutorials. I guess having a poor design be so prevelant spawns a world of thinkers and tinkerers to unite!

[topoly]

Yeah, thanks. I was wondering how bendy it would be. My plan is to have the thick layer under the 1.5mm one be support as well (since the two layer design still leaves room for wires.) I also have a kickstarter 3D printer coming in December that I plan to make mk2 with. It is nice to find a forum with other wierd folks like me. I assumed for years that I was alone in wanting to make my own keyboard till I finally googled for tutorials. I guess having a poor design be so prevelant spawns a world of thinkers and tinkerers to unite!

No doubt! I love being a part of it. I have one of those Tiko printers coming also (assuming that's the one you got) that I'm super excited about - hoping it comes on time.

I think I learned a few lessons using MDF as the sandwich layers inside the keyboard. They ended up warping and flexing a bit - I think your clear acrylic will help quite a bit for stability. I'm really curious to see how having some of those function keys on a second layer lower than the rest works out. Cheers

[VVhitel2abbit]

No doubt! I love being a part of it. I have one of those Tiko printers coming also (assuming that's the one you got) that I'm super excited about - hoping it comes on time.

I think I learned a few lessons using MDF as the sandwich layers inside the keyboard. They ended up warping and flexing a bit - I think your clear acrylic will help quite a bit for stability. I'm really curious to see how having some of those function keys on a second layer lower than the rest works out. Cheers

I actually got the genesis duo. It can print up to a cube square (I kinda want to really print a corvo mask...) I went for the 'holiday special,' so it won't ship till December.

So, I have built two mock, cardboard versions with the real switches on em. After what is probly an hour of fake typing (not all at once... I am not totally crazy) I have come to like the second row. It is not needed enough to get annoying and it's more convenient than the modifiers were before.

[GuilleAcoustic]

Nice project, I'll follow this for sure.

[VVhitel2abbit]

Just a quick update:
I have finally gotten all my supplies and access to the laser cutter on campus. I hope to be able to start getting the case cut this weekend. Within the next few weeks I will hopefully get to start wiring and programming stuff. That may be ambitious, though. We'll see.

I also just updated by blog with a new post. The post describes, in detail, why I made the design decisions I did. You can see how my design has evolved and learn a bit about how we got the keyboards we have today. You can find that post here:
http://tomorrowlabs.blogspot.com/2015/0 ... art-0.html