Alps Appreciation

[cumwagondeluxe]

I always thought it was because of the shape of the tactile leaf. The tactile leaf compresses as a result of pushing the slider down, then as the slider comes back up it wants to spring back open - as a result what you hear is the slider being pushed out of the way on the way back up.

I read something about a "paper" mod earlier (perhaps here) and decided to try sticking thin electrical tape pieces on the back of the tactile leaves on my work-in-progress AEK II, it's a time consuming mod, but it's also worked superbly at removing any click on the upstroke while preserving the tactility.

Electrical tape on the leaf springs, you say?...
So basically you're saying I need to open up all of my Matias Clickies AGAIN?

Got a link describing the mod?

I'm not sure why you'd do it on a clicky switch, as the goal is to eliminate an unintentional click (It doesn't sound good or anything) that some non-clicky tactile switches seem to develop over time. Sounds like you'd just open the switch up and put a small piece of electrical tape on the back of each tactile leaf, though. Personally I'm probably just going to clip the tabs on mine and turn them into clicky switches as I've already tried it on a loose SKCM damped cream I have and it feels/sounds pretty good.

[Scarpia]

Only need 8 SKCM Brown now

For the rest I am offering the reward of 1 SKCL Striped Amber, yes you heard me correctly

DONE!

[cumwagondeluxe]

Only need 8 SKCM Brown now

For the rest I am offering the reward of 1 SKCL Striped Amber, yes you heard me correctly

DONE!

Nice dude! If the 2nd videowriter board I bought had browns on it (goddamn you, Mitsumi :<) I definitely would've taken him up on that offer. Very worthwhile trade, considering it's entirely possible we'll never see another board with 'em again.

Also, that Canon typewriter board with creams popped up on r/mechmarket but somebody got to it before me by like 10min <_< At least he was only selling it for the switches, would've felt way more annoyed if I had missed out on the keycaps as well. Despite some nice stuff waiting for me in the mail from last week, this week has kind of sucked - missed out on those noice cream alps, and also missed out on a BKE-2010 I wanted to harvest for <$100 because the seller was some weird UK auction site and wanted me to make a ~500 deposit to even be allowed to bid on anything in the first place..

[Mattr567]

I actually got them from someone else

[Darkshado]

I always thought it was because of the shape of the tactile leaf. The tactile leaf compresses as a result of pushing the slider down, then as the slider comes back up it wants to spring back open - as a result what you hear is the slider being pushed out of the way on the way back up.

I read something about a "paper" mod earlier (perhaps here) and decided to try sticking thin electrical tape pieces on the back of the tactile leaves on my work-in-progress AEK II, it's a time consuming mod, but it's also worked superbly at removing any click on the upstroke while preserving the tactility.

Electrical tape on the leaf springs, you say?...
So basically you're saying I need to open up all of my Matias Clickies AGAIN?

Got a link describing the mod?

Drevyek's original post here. (Haven't found earlier mentions.)

I consolidated the pictures of my AEK II and posted them here, explains how I've modded it so far. It's still a work-in-progress.

I'm especially proud of the USB port conversion: I haven't seen any other example with a removable USB cable and both ADB ports left intact.

Spoiler:

[tkim]

Well it took a better part of a week but I managed to pretty much read all posts in this thread to get up to speed with ALPS. Thanks to everyone who was kind to share their knowledge.

Just wondering, since the tactile leaf and switch plate is a considerable factor in the weight of the switch, am I meant to spring mod a heavier spring or a lighter spring in blue alps? my only issue with blue alps is their return speed seems to be a bit slow in comparison to my zeal and 55g topre. I have the feeling though I won't need to do anything much I am just curious.

Also there was a comment made about switching cream dampened sliders into blue alps, this is purely for acoustic reasons as I would like to travel with this board however the bottoming out is rather loud against a plate.Has anybody experienced a slider swap with either Matias quiet or cream dampened into blue alps?

[cumwagondeluxe]

Well it took a better part of a week but I managed to pretty much read all posts in this thread to get up to speed with ALPS. Thanks to everyone who was kind to share their knowledge.

Just wondering, since the tactile leaf and switch plate is a considerable factor in the weight of the switch, am I meant to spring mod a heavier spring or a lighter spring in blue alps? my only issue with blue alps is their return speed seems to be a bit slow in comparison to my zeal and 55g topre. I have the feeling though I won't need to do anything much I am just curious.

Also there was a comment made about switching cream dampened sliders into blue alps, this is purely for acoustic reasons as I would like to travel with this board however the bottoming out is rather loud against a plate.Has anybody experienced a slider swap with either Matias quiet or cream dampened into blue alps?

I think you'd have to use the silenced Matias sliders. Cream and white damped alps both have little bits of plastic that stick up from the bottom of the switch for the rubber to land on when bottoming out since the rubber pieces don't actually stick out below the slider. I'm pretty sure they'd make little to no difference swapped into a regular switch.

If I had to make a silent alps board, I'd probably go with linear modded cream/white damped alps. I don't have a good green or yellow alps board to compare with, but just based off the sound alone I'm pretty sure I prefer these to some SKCL greens I've got lying around. Definitely the thockiest purely mechanical switch I've tried so far, and that's mounted on the AEK steel plate - it would probably be even better on a plastic plate like the HHKB's.

[tkim]

Ah thanks for that, shame that matias quiet clicks are sold out everywhere.

If anyone has some for sale to fill a 60% let me know

[Daniel Beardsmore]

Rather than create a whole topic, I thought I'd mention this here. It's been believed for years that SKCL/SKCM production ended in 1996, and that SKBL/SKBM started at the same time. So far as I know, there's no evidence for either claim. This information is nothing more than Chinese whispers — MouseFan's website seems to support it, but there's no evidence there, and no statistical rigour behind his timeline chart.

Chyros claims that SKCM (white damped?) remained in production until something like 2000, although without demonstrating this yet.

However, I took another look at my SKCMCQ/SKCLAR PDF (it's on the wiki), and it's marked as being created on 1998-11-26 and modified on 1999-04-13. This does prove that yellow Alps was still around 1999, which ties up with claims that it was still in production at that time (there's a particular yellow Alps keyboard that many people will recall — might be branded Sharp).

I thought that the "C" meant bamboo, but this seems unlikely, as pine and bamboo green are both SKCMAT. The model (e.g. SKCCAF) is followed by extra codes (e.g. 002A) that appear to indicate revisions, so bamboo is likely denoted by higher revision codes. SKCCAF002A is definitely not the original SKCCAF design.

Regular white Alps is SKCMAQ, and this switch in the datasheet seems to be the same specification and design, but is inexplicably type C. The meaning of type C is still a mystery.

[Chyros]

Rather than create a whole topic, I thought I'd mention this here. It's been believed for years that SKCL/SKCM production ended in 1996, and that SKBL/SKBM started at the same time. So far as I know, there's no evidence for either claim. This information is nothing more than Chinese whispers — MouseFan's website seems to support it, but there's no evidence there, and no statistical rigour behind his timeline chart.

Chyros claims that SKCM (white damped?) remained in production until something like 2000, although without demonstrating this yet.

However, I took another look at my SKCMCQ/SKCLAR PDF (it's on the wiki), and it's marked as being created on 1998-11-26 and modified on 1999-04-13. This does prove that yellow Alps was still around 1999, which ties up with claims that it was still in production at that time (there's a particular yellow Alps keyboard that many people will recall — might be branded Sharp).

I thought that the "C" meant bamboo, but this seems unlikely, as pine and bamboo green are both SKCMAT. The model (e.g. SKCCAF) is followed by extra codes (e.g. 002A) that appear to indicate revisions, so bamboo is likely denoted by higher revision codes. SKCCAF002A is definitely not the original SKCCAF design.

Regular white Alps is SKCMAQ, and this switch in the datasheet seems to be the same specification and design, but is inexplicably type C. The meaning of type C is still a mystery.

No, my white damped board was from 1998 as I recall (it's in the video somewhere, but it was definitely off MouseFan's timeline) and my youngest AT101W is from 2001. Maybe I have a picture lying around somewhere (I hate opening them up because the stupid plastic clips can break easily). Didn't I send it to you ages ago or something?

[Lynx_Carpathica]

Chicony KB-5181 is my favourite keyboard for now. Came with a wide variety of switches, and the build quality is not that bad. Cable 3 way router is present with a 2-part flipout feet, though the keycaps are junk. Anyway, the keyboard didn't have any stickers, so I made one for it with my Epson FX-980 dot-matrix, therefore it looks even more retro Originally came with White Alps, short switchplate, logo on the top.

THE LAST OF US

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PS: the keyboard is not warped. The picture is shit
Edit: Lol F1 and F11 are swapped xD

[Daniel Beardsmore]

No, my white damped board was from 1998 as I recall (it's in the video somewhere, but it was definitely off MouseFan's timeline) and my youngest AT101W is from 2001. Maybe I have a picture lying around somewhere (I hate opening them up because the stupid plastic clips can break easily). Didn't I send it to you ages ago or something?

Without proper documentation, I'm going on vague memories of what I thought you said somewhere or other. Somewhere there's a keyboard with yellow Alps from some year or other, and another one showed up at Geekhack somewhere at some point or other — I'm not sure whether I ever saw any proof of the date on that one … Sharp, maybe?

[arkanoid]

No, my white damped board was from 1998 as I recall (it's in the video somewhere, but it was definitely off MouseFan's timeline) and my youngest AT101W is from 2001. Maybe I have a picture lying around somewhere (I hate opening them up because the stupid plastic clips can break easily). Didn't I send it to you ages ago or something?

Without proper documentation, I'm going on vague memories of what I thought you said somewhere or other. Somewhere there's a keyboard with yellow Alps from some year or other, and another one showed up at Geekhack somewhere at some point or other — I'm not sure whether I ever saw any proof of the date on that one … Sharp, maybe?

Yellow ALPS without LED holes in base had been made at least until late 2001. See the date in the red stamp on the box.
http://aucview.aucfan.com/yahoo/p523953255/

[mike52787]

Finally finished it

[Chyros]

Noice.

[Daniel Beardsmore]

Yellow ALPS without LED holes in base had been made at least until late 2001. See the date in the red stamp on the box.
http://aucview.aucfan.com/yahoo/p523953255/

I was hoping that you were Japanese and could get your hands on those photos — I see that the goods have already been sold.

Curiously the description is for 1200 pieces, but the box says 1000 pieces.

[andrewjoy]

Finally finished it

Now that is fucking sweet.

EDIT , i see you already have SGI PBT on it !


You got yourself something special there.

[Hypersphere]

Spoiler:

Finally finished it

I see there is someone else in our midst who likes to paint Northgate cases!

[subcat]

I've been waiting on completing this for a while! Thank you to everyone who helped out

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[Scarpia]

WOW subcat -- that's a beauty! You should really make a separate thread for that one and show us all its glorious guts.

Also, where did you find that sexy donor board?

[Mattr567]

Nice to see more switch collections pop up! It seems I have started a trend

[subcat]

WOW subcat -- that's a beauty! You should really make a separate thread for that one and show us all its glorious guts.

Also, where did you find that sexy donor board?

There isn't much to show, it's just a plate and case
These are Silicon Graphics button boxes that come with either SKCL Grey or SKCL Cream switches, with LEDs. Never has something made me contemplate suicide so frequently in the desoldering process...
I got this particular one of Taobao, proxied to me by a member here, and many of the switches I would not have without the kindness of members here, such as Daniel Beardsmore who paid to ship me that SKCM Green along with a myriad of other interesting NOS switches, some of which I had never seen before.
So really this is a culmination of the community here. I'm very happy to have completed it!

Nice to see more switch collections pop up! It seems I have started a trend

This was indeed inspired by this very picture. That Striped Amber would not be there if it wasn't for you either

[n__dles]

How do you remove switches from the plate without damaging the wings/clips? (I'm not sure of the proper terminology)

Is there an Alps switch puller?

Sometimes I use an MX switch puller, but it mars the housing and I occasionally end up with a broken wing. When I have more patience I flip the plate upside down and pinch the wings with my fingers; never a damaged switch, but damaged fingers and time consuming.

[Chyros]

How do you remove switches from the plate without damaging the wings/clips? (I'm not sure of the proper terminology)

Is there an Alps switch puller?

Sometimes I use an MX switch puller, but it mars the housing and I occasionally end up with a broken wing. When I have more patience I flip the plate upside down and pinch the wings with my fingers; never a damaged switch, but damaged fingers and time consuming.

Just bend the wings inwards with your fingers and pull them out from the other side .

[Scottex]

Just bend the wings inwards with your fingers and pull them out from the other side .

To be able to do this you have to desolder the whole board though

[Hypersphere]

How essential are the wings? Will Alps still fly (as it were) with broken wings?

[Chyros]

How essential are the wings? Will Alps still fly (as it were) with broken wings?

I know the wiki says the wings snap off very easily but tbh I've scavenged maybe 2000 Alps switches off boards and I haven't lost a single wing on ANY of them. So it's really not very relevant .

Just bend the wings inwards with your fingers and pull them out from the other side .

To be able to do this you have to desolder the whole board though

Well, yes, in order to take switches wholly out of keyboards you generally have to desolder them :p .

[n__dles]

How essential are the wings? Will Alps still fly (as it were) with broken wings?

I just tested the movement of a switch with all 4 wings removed (no switches were harmed) and another with them intact.

With wings there's virtually no lateral movement. Without wings there's a small amount, maybe a mil. As far as cap removal is concerned, without wings is essentially PCB mount. Since some Alps caps are notoriously tight *cough*SP*cough* removal of the caps could potentially lead to switch chattering or failure.

If I'm not mistaken Alps SKCL/SKCM bottom halfs are interchangeable without perceptible difference in feel. Might as well replace a wingless bottom half with one salvaged from a worn out switch.

[Chyros]

How essential are the wings? Will Alps still fly (as it were) with broken wings?

I just tested the movement of a switch with all 4 wings removed (no switches were harmed) and another with them intact.

With wings there's virtually no lateral movement. Without wings there's a small amount, maybe a mil. As far as cap removal is concerned, without wings is essentially PCB mount. Since some Alps caps are notoriously tight *cough*SP*cough* removal of the caps could potentially lead to switch chattering or failure.

If I'm not mistaken Alps SKCL/SKCM bottom halfs are interchangeable without perceptible difference in feel. Might as well replace a wingless bottom half with one salvaged from a worn out switch.

Some switch types use specific bottom parts. But they shouldn't affect keyfeel too much as long as they're compatible.

[n__dles]

Some switch types use specific bottom parts. But they shouldn't affect keyfeel too much as long as they're compatible.

The best way to get an answer on the internet is to say something incorrect

Although, I'm not sure we're talking about the same thing? I meant just the bottom housing, not switchplate etc.. Which share the same bottom housing and which are unique? Probably in one of your videos if you'd rather link to it than explain here.