deskthority

I'm in the process of restoring an old beamspring 3278 keyboard and wanted to ask what the best way to clean the case is ?

I will spray Ballistol on the metal bottom in order to prevent future rusting. Should I just clean the case with water and soap or would you recommend a more sophisticated treatment?

Thanks in advance!

There are several highly detailed beamspring restoration threads where folks have painstakingly documented each step and equipment/procedures used.

Have you searched for these already and still have questions? If not, they might give you some good ideas about what to do/not do.

Yes I have, but most probably not good enough, because I didn't find the answers I wanted
Will do that again but this time more thoroughly

Just checking- would hate for you to miss out on all the great resources when embarking on a project like this!

Not sure about the condition yours is in. I did bog standard IPA and a white kitchen towel to clean the outer case. Get a bit of the towel damp, then gently swirl to remove dirt in the nooks and crannies of the paint texture. Mine has a couple of paint chips and I didn't want to soak it in plain water. Haven't read too much in others threads about case cleaning as a lot of folks seem to be repainting theirs.

raoulduke-esq wrote: 13 Apr 2021, 15:54 Just checking- would hate for you to miss out on all the great resources when embarking on a project like this!

Not sure about the condition yours is in. I did bog standard IPA and a white kitchen towel to clean the outer case. Get a bit of the towel damp, then gently swirl to remove dirt in the nooks and crannies of the paint texture. Mine has a couple of paint chips and I didn't want to soak it in plain water. Haven't read too much in others threads about case cleaning as a lot of folks seem to be repainting theirs.

I had to sand down my 3278 case and get it powder coated again due to a lot of chipped spots. Prior doing that I have cleaned it with a cloth (Mikrofasertuch) and some soap and warm water.

btw: I saw that some of your keys have yellowed plastic. I had a few of those as well and used a modified retr0bright method. A fair warning here, if you plan to do the same. While the white on the key really did lighten up, the rest of the key did also. Below is a (bad) shot of the 8 - key. You can see how different the gray is compared to 7 and 9 .... (and while taking a picture ... I saw it is horrible dusty also ...)

Thanks for the replies! I think I won't have to sand down my case luckily, also for as of right now I'm staying away from retr0brighting until I have more experience with it I think I will just try to get rid of the dirt and dust with a mikrofasertuch and that should be enough

Mikrofasertuch für Tastatur putzen... Everything is more interesting in German.

raoulduke-esq wrote: 13 Apr 2021, 17:09 Mikrofasertuch für Tastatur putzen... Everything is more interesting in German.

No worries, I am not continuing with our Austro-Bavarian dialect

Some mild soap and warm water goes a long way. I would avoid any oily products to protect metal. Maybe the tiniest bit on the springs. Just keep it dry in storage. Also a lot of the restoration guides use rust remover products liberally. They're fine on most parts, but I would avoid them on the zinc plated housing. Some of those products will remove the zinc as well.

As has been said, I wouldn't spray anything on the case. If you find rust on the case it is probably from other steel/iron parts and not from the case itself.
My cleaning for keycaps or cases is always a first step with dish soap/water and a sponge cloth. Then a second step with 70% alcohol and a microfibre cloth + a lot of scrubbing. If there are still some small dark spots after that, I try to scrape them off very carefully with a sharp knife.