Topre 39-AA-0101

[Icarium]

I assume you have an SLA printer?

[andreas]

This looks amazing! I would not have guessed these were printed. The legends looks crisp!

Can you tell us a bit more about the process of making these (and how you made the legends), and do you have more pictures from more angles?

Thank you so much. Here are some quick phone snapshots fresh from today, right after I removed print-supports for four hours

It's a 'regular' resin print at 0.03 mm layer height. The legends are printed with a recess and filled with the very same resin, but with a different color. As mentioned before, the gray spacebar was a test print and the gray acted strange during print, resulting in white clouds. I've learned from that print though and will now make adjustments and print the final one blue, same as the alphas.

[andreas]

I assume you have an SLA printer?

Yes, an Elegoo Mars 2 Pro.

[andreas]

Thank you, Mu, for that extensive clarification — I can now follow you and make sense of the HiPro situation
From the looks of them, I fell I want to agree with you.

The keycaps above are URSA Minor, same deep dishes, yet OEM height. URS Major is quite a bit higher.

Sounds good to me.

What color are your HHKB caps or case?

[kekstee]

This looks amazing! I would not have guessed these were printed. The legends looks crisp!

Can you tell us a bit more about the process of making these (and how you made the legends), and do you have more pictures from more angles?

Thank you so much. Here are some quick phone snapshots fresh from today, right after I removed print-supports for four hours :lol:

It's a 'regular' resin print at 0.03 mm layer height. The legends are printed with a recess and filled with the very same resin, but with a different color. As mentioned before, the gray spacebar was a test print and the gray acted strange during print, resulting in white clouds. I've learned from that print though and will now make adjustments and print the final one blue, same as the alphas.

Inredible results from those pictures. I'm curious about the infill though, did you just pour it on and remove excess before curing?
Also this makes me wonder how that resin would take to a careful sandblast for some texture.

[andreas]

Hi and thank you so much,

the legends are filled with a fine brush — a real Zen thing all in all about 4-5 hours for the 189 glyphs

I tried pouring / overfilling, but due to the micro structure gaps from the LCD, I could never get the surface sufficiently clean again. It always ended in a strangely coated surface, because I use highly pigmented resin.

Sandblasting sounds like something fun to try, but I do not have access to a sandblaster.

[Muirium]

Hand painted with a brush? True artisans!

To answer your question about my HHKB colour way: several!



For what it’s worth: keycap height isn’t what I like about beamspring so much. In fact, I also really like OG Cherry profile caps, which are very low profile indeed! No, what gets me going is the curvature of the top surface of the cap. The dishing. Beamspring gets this right, and MT3 comes quite close, yet Cherry caps and Topre cylindricals are also downright delightful, because of their curves.

Tall caps with boring curves include SA profile, which is really quite high, but not very interesting, and Topre’s own HiPro, which you already heard my opinions about. Tall is no guarantee of character. In fact, what I really like the best is short caps with juicy curvature.

But it’s all personal preference of course.

[mmm]

Thanks for filling us in on the details. The hours spent filling in the legends have definitely paid off!

[andreas]

Thanks for filling us in on the details. The hours spent filling in the legends have definitely paid off!

Thank you so much. I totally forgot to mention, there is no post-processing on the caps in terms of coating, polishing, or sanding. It's still something I want to experiment with.

[andreas]

I took some more photos and would like to share them with you.

[Muirium]

Hearts for eyes emoji.

[andreas]

I'm happy to say the project is shaping up for production.

Spherical Topre lovers go here:
https://fkcaps.com/keycaps/ursa

[Muirium]

Any word on who? Hope it’s not the same Chinese outfit as KBDfans Topre sets. Those skewed mounts still haunt me.

[andreas]

The manufacturing is managed by FK. The both of us are very aware of the issue with the KBDFans offering. It's something we'll be paying close attention for URSA to be right.

[andreas]

Great News:

https://fkcaps.com/keycaps/ursa/survey

The project is up for IC. Please come over and help us launch a great project for the Topre community.

[inozenz]

Great News:

https://fkcaps.com/keycaps/ursa/survey

The project is up for IC. Please come over and help us launch a great project for the Topre community.

I see iso being no option, I guess iso can't compete with ansi

[Muirium]

A more interesting colourway, please.



All black like that would look awful on a white HHKB, and most HHKBs are white.

Also: I’m blocked from the survey because Gmail is blocking your emails.

Edit:
Weird, maybe my phone’s adblockers are messing it up. I wrote responses but they won’t submit, and in a different browser I’m getting halted for a password I never was asked to make.

So here goes…

How do you feel about the minicom design?
No good on white HHKBs or Realforces. Can’t buy. Why not something more colourful like Round 5 Honeywell or classic Dolch or daring Dasher?
The pics you posted (earlier this very page) are honestly 1000 × more desirable than a snoozy WoB set that lacks character in its modifier tone and clashes on most Realforces and HHKBs out there. Be bold. Ship what you showed us!

Comment about kits
Please include Escape and Enter accent keys in the base kit, they’d really smarten it up. Also allows the Accent kit to try something different of its own, letting completists really mix it up. We all love options.

Keyboards owned
2 × HHKB pro 2, ANSI, one black one white
Realforce 87U, ANSI, white

No interest in JIS or ISO for me but I understand the few who do.

[andreas]

Great News:

https://fkcaps.com/keycaps/ursa/survey

The project is up for IC. Please come over and help us launch a great project for the Topre community.

I see iso being no option, I guess iso can't compete with ansi

I'll work on ISO Enter over the next few months and print you the missing keys
Aren't you based in Germany, too?

[inozenz]

Great News:

https://fkcaps.com/keycaps/ursa/survey

The project is up for IC. Please come over and help us launch a great project for the Topre community.

I see iso being no option, I guess iso can't compete with ansi

I'll work on ISO Enter over the next few months and print you the missing keys
Aren't you based in Germany, too?

Yeah, only German keycaps on my table I'm so limited...

[guidemetothelight]

No interest in JIS or ISO for me but I understand the few who do.

Screen_Shot_2020-10-05_at_11.51.58_AM.png (1.69 MiB) Viewed 84017 times

just kidding, but some ISO (DE) support would be great. I limited myself to using only german keycaps.

[Muirium]

Got an email update about this. Just the same poll I already answered, alas, on the same all-WoB colourway I’m not into and a gallery of alternatives which were equally as bland. The pale “beige” set is the only one which even disgtinguishes modifiers.

Andreas: why not this?



Where did the good stuff go? Double shots want to be BOLD and Exhilarating!

[guidemetothelight]

Andreas: why not this?

Iam with µ on this.
The only set I really wanna buy is this red & blue one.
Hopefully in iso ?

[TNT]

While I'd totally jump on a JIS replacement set for my 106, even in pale beige, I kind of have to agree here. The Sachiko colorway is simply too beautiful, Andreas.

[Muirium]

The colours are the game. I’m not even bothered about the dual legends, the big centred ones will do perfectly well enough. But high contrast between alphas and modifiers are a must, and only juicy colourways bring the lust!

As for ISO: just throw in both Return keys and left Shifts so that everyone shares the cost. The difference is quite marginal if ISO buyers are willing to put up with English legends instead of full blown national łàŷøütš.

[guidemetothelight]

The difference is quite marginal if ISO buyers are willing to put up with English legends instead of full blown national łàŷøütš.

I can only speak for myself ofc , but I only buy sets with DE support.
Iam more then happy to purchase an international set separately, if it will be offered at all.

łàŷøütš

I love this.

[Muirium]

Saw this update in my email inbox:

URSA GROUP BUY ANNOUNCEMENT
It has been a few weeks now that we have announced URSA to the world, and the first colorway by biip, and have been silent since. The reason is we have been looking for funding from private investors, set up meetings, met people, pitched URSA and well, long story short, they are not impressed. This has been a blow to our strategy, as we can’t afford to upfront the costs, but really wanted to have the products directly in stock. It took us a couple weeks to swallow our pride after our last hope faded away, and re-adjust our timeline and targets. Here is the new plan.

The GB's not live, and won't be for a while yet by the looks.

In the spirit of listening to the moneymen and changing tack towards a group buy: I'd suggest once again changing to a distinctive, lively colorway. I'd be much more excited and likely to join this GB if the caps weren't so pallid.

Spoiler:

[TNT]

In the spirit of listening to the moneymen and changing tack towards a group buy: I'd suggest once again changing to a distinctive, lively colorway. I'd be much more excited and likely to join this GB if the caps weren't so pallid.

Spoiler:

Hey Mµ,

I think you might have missed this section of the announcement:

URSA.PNG (695.14 KiB) Viewed 81806 times

[Muirium]

That's the previous blog post, though, and the current one states there is an "initial colorway", with white on black as a "stretch goal." What's unclear is precisely which colorway that is. The email announcement is a great big picture of the pale beige and beige set I linked in the spoiler above. It's also the first one in your screenshot; the other three apparently being off the table until later. The "biip design" he mentions appears to be the Minicom colorway, which isn't actually pictured on the blog. There is a greyed out image of that design in the survey signup form, however.

My past experience with group buys is that "initial" things tend to wind up being the only ones ultimately produced. No battle plan survives contact unscathed.

When launching a GB, show us pics of the thing you're going to sell please. Other plans must wait, and they often do forever. Pick the very best one you've got and run with it.

[TNT]

Ah damn, you're completely right man

[Muirium]

Just reminded about this again by email:

https://ursa.fkcaps.com

Looks like the pre-orders are live now, and with more interesting colour ways than I feared. Phew! I might just go in for a Minicom kit. I’ve only got the one black Topre after all.