HHKB Type-S first row extremely mushy

[Tyrosh22]

Hey,
I've just received a used HHKB Type-S. The first row (numbers and F-Keys) feels extremely mushy and non-tactile. Has anyone experienced this before? Any suggestions on how to fix it? I've tried lubing the board which resulted in an even better sound but it did not change the feeling of said row.

[Khers]

When Topres feel a little mushy it is often due to a misalignment between the rubber dome and the switch housing. This leads to the slider not hitting the center of the dome, leading to mushiness.

[Tyrosh22]

Thank you for the quick reply. I'll open up the board and have a look at that and then report back!

[Khers]

No problem! Just take care not to loose any of the springs, spacebar or others, when opening the keyboard, take your time and it'll be smooth sailing.

[Tyrosh22]

I'm familiar with the spring losing and searching, the hope and despair, in short: the topre experience. I've done a couple of silencing mods on a NovaTouch and a regular HHKB, all with unpleasant results. The loss of tactility mainly ruined it for me. But at least I've learned to be careful when taking a topre board apart.

[Khers]

Yeah, unfortunately it's something that must be experienced to be learnt!

What silencing mods have you done? I dental banded one of my HHKBs once. But it got awful to type on, so I had to un-silence it again. Now I've got some of Hyper's silencing rings that I will install.

[Tyrosh22]

I dental banded my NovaTouch. It was awful, felt almost like a linear switch after that. Then I tried the foam pads from EK, ironed them as flat as I could get them. It's better but the loss of tactility is still huge. Compared to the Type-S the sound isn't so great either (but then it's a NovaTouch which has the most horrible clack of all times). Eventually I was too lazy to undo the foam pad mod - and partially because an unmodded NovaTouch is too much to handle for my ears.

[Khers]

Ok, so ironed soft landing pads is another mod that I don't need to do then

I share your thoughts on the switch's feeling after dental banding, it felt like a rather poor linear. Sure it was smooth like a normal Topre, but it felt awkward at the top of the travel.

Given the reports elsewhere on the net, I have rather high hopes for the silencing rings. I guess my fingers will give their verdict soon. Worst case scenario is to transplant some purple damped sliders from my RF87S, but I would like to avoid that.

[Tyrosh22]

Given my poor results with other methods I've been quite reluctant to go for yet another selfmade silencing mode, especially considering the Hyper Rings are like ~80 dollars, are they not? I'm looking forward to your experience. Right now I feel like the Type-S is the best silenced Topre board but I still prefer the feeling of a standard HHKB.

[Tyrosh22]

So I opened the Type-S and had a look. Most of the domes were still glued to the PCB and it didn't look as if any of it were misaligned. When pressing down on the domes, the first row feels mushy where the rest feels tactile. Could the domes be worn out or something like that? I would not have expected this from a 5 year old board though (and it would seem strange to see that happen to the number keys when there are other keys who should be used more frequently.)

Help