deskthority

In case there are other ones out there who are tinkering with old keyboards and have their own work bench, this is the topic to share yours.
I know, things can always change, but I would be interested what tools / work bench others are using. I have my little "man cave" in the basement with a few items I gathered over the years. Below are a few "unfiltered" photos ...

I’ve just moved, so no pics till the house is fixed up enough to resume smaller, keyboard-sized, projects.

Your wall mounted tools are smart. I fumble around much too much in dark little drawers.

What’s the Cube doing, besides providing a keyboard and mouse a posh little penthouse? For a long while I had a similarly specced (and speakered) iMac G4 providing workspace listening, including many keyboard operations like my first awakened Kishsaver…

Muirium wrote: 11 Feb 2023, 10:13 I’ve just moved, so no pics till the house is fixed up enough to resume smaller, keyboard-sized, projects.

Your wall mounted tools are smart. I fumble around much too much in dark little drawers.

What’s the Cube doing, besides providing a keyboard and mouse a posh little penthouse? For a long while I had a similarly specced (and speakered) iMac G4 providing workspace listening, including many keyboard operations like my first awakened Kishsaver…

Spoiler:

The Cube has been emptied and I fitted it with a new power supply and parts of a M1 Mac mini. I even got the proximity sensor and LED working.
I think I could retro-fit a M2 Mac mini into a iMac G4 Lamp On the 20" model it shoud be a bit simpler because of the LCD they've been using in it. Downside is the cold cathode backlight of those displays - they just fade over time or worse, lose brightness on the edges because of moisture creeping between the foil sandwich.

Love the Saltire in the background

I should get one of those:
https://www.amazon.de/-/en/AZ-FLAG-Bava ... B01LWX0QQK

Going by this, Bayern definitely has the best flag of the Länder. In my view: every well designed flag can be drawn by a child in under a minute. Animals and hordes of pentagrams be damned!

I too have long thought of modding the G4 with a Mac Mini. Bit fiddly with that old cold cathode display. Never have gotten round to it. Besides, my iMac is the middle child at 17 inch. A pretty thing but an awkward one.

Let's just say, blue and white colored flags are just awesome

darkcruix wrote: 10 Feb 2023, 22:00 In case there are other ones out there who are tinkering with old keyboards and have their own work bench, this is the topic to share yours.
I know, things can always change, but I would be interested what tools / work bench others are using. I have my little "man cave" in the basement with a few items I gathered over the years.

A literal "man cave" would be an ultimate dream for me. Space to work on electronics, bicycles, cars, a machine shop, wood shop, etc.

My tool collection is still in it's infacy compared to this. I would love to hear about some of your essential, favorite or interesting tools if you have the time.

I've got an old battered kitchen table propped up in my bedroom, which is always full of various stuff: most often shoe boxes of tools and materials.
Some people would call me a hoarder, but I do get rid of stuff that I don't find useful. I just need something like a separate hobby room or garage for more space for my hobbies.

JP! wrote: 11 Feb 2023, 19:26 ...
My tool collection is still in it's infacy compared to this. I would love to hear about some of your essential, favorite or interesting tools if you have the time.

I can talk about the tools I constantly use. Some of them are inexpensive but others have been a large investment over time.

Let me talk about my soldering area first. I can talk about the other things as well, if people find it interesting.
I do like my soldering station a lot, even if it is not super expensive, it can be fitted with different standard tips and the heat can be adjusted in the range I need it (200'C to 400'C). It is the Atten AT-980D. The second most important piece was the de-soldering iron. Originally I bought it, because had a crusty F122 in my posession and de-soldering with the wig was a nightmare. I killed a via back then and thought I ruined the keyboard. Later when I did more and more vintage keyboard restoration or switch replacements, it is just so great to have. I bought the Komerci ZD-915. The best thing is the broad availability of the replacement parts. I already replaced the pistol once and the container. The hot air "gun" came much later in the game, when I did more and more SMD soldering. As soon as you want to play with your own PCBs or prepare controller for a project, this is the way to go. Also, it is nice for removing surface mount stuff from vintage boards (not so common). I bought the 858D FAOKZE Hot Air Soldering Station - definitely not the best one out there, but it has air pressure adjustment and heat adjustment for less than USD 50.

My latest purchase is my stereo microscope (AMScope SM-4TZ). It was super expensive, but my previous one was too cheap to be any good. I should have invested in this one in the beginning. I think you can do a few things with a cheap microscope as well, but if you want to do more work on things, I'd say this is the one to consider: Obviously there a tons of things around soldering, which I use when doing stuff. Here's my table and what I always have next to the soldering mat:
- Flux Paste
- Dental Tool - especially important for vintage stuff when you need to get crusty things off of things
- Two pairs of my more expensive tweezers (titanium)
- Scraping scalpels
- Clipper
- De-solder wig (not in picture)
- Good solder spools in various sizes (not in picture)

I love seeing how others set up their work areas! I'll throw my current electronics bench out there:
I keep meaning to build a proper workbench but the shelving units work well enough that I can never muster the motivation.

jsheradin wrote: 12 Feb 2023, 03:03 I love seeing how others set up their work areas! I'll throw my current electronics bench out there:
...
I keep meaning to build a proper workbench but the shelving units work well enough that I can never muster the motivation.

Great area - I wish I had so much space, but my 1950s house has only a partial basement. I love that corner and the lighting from under the shelf.

I am still playing with my space and moving some of my vintage computers into the attic.

I love this!!! We bought our first house three years ago and I immediately set up a workshop in the cellar — I’ve never had the luxury of having a dedicated space where I could leave my tools and projects out, so this was a priority for me.

Tool-wise, the woodworking station has an old Swedish carpenter’s workbench, a decent DeWalt table saw, a lovely vintage Inca bandsaw, a beefy disc sander, and most of the common power tools (bought second hand; DeWalt, Makita and Hilti), a cheapo modern drill press, and a growing collection of hand planes, chisels, japanese pull saws, etc.
(I know the lighting is terrible in this corner. It’s a work in progress.)

The electronics station (which sadly sits just across from the dusty woodworking area) has a couple of old analog scopes, a nice Proxxon multitool, the TS100 soldering iron (flashed with the community firmware), a cheap bench power supply, a solder fume filter fan, and an ultrasonic cleaner. Nothing fancy here, just enough for me.

darkcruix wrote: 11 Feb 2023, 23:12 I can talk about the tools I constantly use. Some of them are inexpensive but others have been a large investment over time.

Love this. A nice desoldering tool has been on my list for a while.

Scarpia wrote: 12 Feb 2023, 18:08 I love this!!! We bought our first house three years ago and I immediately set up a workshop in the cellar — I’ve never had the luxury of having a dedicated space where I could leave my tools and projects out, so this was a priority for me.

Tool-wise, the woodworking station has an old Swedish carpenter’s workbench, a decent DeWalt table saw, a lovely vintage Inca bandsaw, a beefy disc sander, and most of the common power tools (bought second hand; DeWalt, Makita and Hilti), a cheapo modern drill press, and a growing collection of hand planes, chisels, japanese pull saws, etc.

7FD663C8-077D-462C-905C-9575792B6725.jpeg

951F1CAC-B385-428D-9EA1-5EC7DB51393C.jpeg

(I know the lighting is terrible in this corner. It’s a work in progress.)

The electronics station (which sadly sits just across from the dusty woodworking area) has a couple of old analog scopes, a nice Proxxon multitool, the TS100 soldering iron (flashed with the community firmware), a cheap bench power supply, a solder fume filter fan, and an ultrasonic cleaner. Nothing fancy here, just enough for me.

1449AD6F-FDE7-4FA6-AFD8-A872B607215F.jpeg

Love these pictures - thanks so much for sharing ....!!!!