Custom Hall Effect Switch Keyboard

[Icarium]

This keyboard was built by my dad and some friends/coworkers sometime around 1980 so it's definitely over 30 years old.
There was a black one as well but pictures of that will be posted in the workshop subforum. *cough*

keyboard

DSC01703keyboardsmall.jpg (155.07 KiB) Viewed 14028 times

Note the most awesome caps lock key ever, in the far top left corner.
And of course it has an aluminium case which seem to be the latest rage.


This is what's on the inside of this baby:

inside

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Note that the hall effect switches are placed in a neat grid which allows simple customizing. If I can find some more keycaps for this might even do that.


Now here is the interesting part. A picture of the hall effect switches, I assume most people haven't seen them before like me.

hall effect switches

DSC01716switches.JPG (498.27 KiB) Viewed 14028 times

So on the left is a switch the way it is assembled. The outer casing, basically just a plastic box with some "rails" (more on the top right) then the slider, with the two magnets (several more colorful examples on the right) and at the bottom the chip with the soldering pins to attach it to the board. Top middle shows two assembled switches, the chip is stuck in the case and the slider is able to move between them.

Now how does this all fit together?

The mounting plate is placed on top of the PCB and the chip is soldered to the PCB through the plate. The rest of the switch is then placed on top of it and held in place with metal clips. The spring is stuck between the slider and the mounting plate. Maybe this picture will clear it up a bit.

fancy switchmounting

DSC01717switchesmounting.JPG (724.38 KiB) Viewed 14028 times

I like how this all fits together because it allows you to replace all parts of the switch except the chip with relative ease. Even though hall effect switches are according to wikipedia very robust this seems handy. I already had to take one out and grease it a bit, more on that later.


Okay, on to the keycaps!

I actually like those A LOT.
I don't know what they're made of but they're double shots, spherical and all-in-all look like keycaps people would still dig today.

keycaps

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One thing you could complain about is shining.

shiny

DSC01706shiny.JPG (309.98 KiB) Viewed 14028 times

But these were shiny on purpose and so they don't look worn at all. I suppose some people don't like shiny keycaps because of the fingerprints on them but I think they look awesome and they definitely age very well.

Sadly international layouts were even less popular back then, so these guys took to making there own. O_o

painted caps

DSC01721paintedkeycaps.JPG (393.16 KiB) Viewed 14028 times

Apparently spraypainting the caps, rub-on letters and drawing ink and enamling in the end seemed like a good idea at the time. I just mourn those beautiful red doubleshots.
I have to admit that the rub-on letters actually turned out pretty well, though.
The varnish sadly didn't age as well as the material of the caps and yellowed so the umlauts stand out a lot in the first picture.

Alright, enough with the history lesson for today.
Let me know if I misused any of the technical terms; like "varnish" O_o.

If you have any caps for this please get in touch, same goes for switches, I have some spares but more would be nice.

It's some sort of parallel port but I hope that a Teensy will, as always, do the trick and I will be able to actually use this.

[002]

Looks great!
I have a Hall Effect numpad (thanks HaaTa), but I'd love to have a full keyboard to play around with.

[7bit]

Looks like the keys are from the same manufacturer!

What was the prupose of that keybord, BTW?

[off]

Grats on digging up that DIY variant of the Space Cadet!
Awesome caps indeed.

[itlnstln]

What do the switches feel like (I don't think I saw that in the OP)?

[Peter]

Please send some pictures of those keycaps to Mellissa @ Signature Plastics -
Subject : THIS is how to do it !

And I thought the caps on my beam-spring IBM-board where thick ...
Only place I've seen caps that thick IRL is on old calculators !!

[itlnstln]

You could break windows throwing those caps.

[7bit]

You could break windows throwing those caps.

Windows is broken by design.

No way these key caps can do any further harm!

[daedalus]

The switches have "MICRO USA" on them, they're almost certainly the same Honeywell Micro Switch switches you'd find on the Symbolics keyboards.

[ripster]

That is one bigass capacitor there.

ALL doubleshot keys used to be shiny in the old days. Never seemed to bother millions of faster typists than us.
http://deskthority.net/photos-videos-f8 ... t2806.html

[Icarium]

Q&A:

What do the switches feel like (I don't think I saw that in the OP)?

They're linear. There is only one spring in them and no fancy mechanics.

The switches have "MICRO USA" on them, they're almost certainly the same Honeywell Micro Switch switches you'd find on the Symbolics keyboards.

I've just looked at the pictures in this thread: http://deskthority.net/keyboards-f2/the ... s-t98.html and they look different. As 7bit noted the keycaps seem to be the same, though. I would therefor like to start a motion that webwit has to give me all his lisp keyboards. He probably doesn't even know any lisp anyway.

What was the prupose of that keybord, BTW?

Very mundane, it was the keyboard of the home computer they built.

z80a

DSC01724computer.JPG (789.72 KiB) Viewed 13944 times

The purpose of the computer obviously was that I could play text adventures when I was little. With my mum reading the text to me. It was so slow drawing that ascii art castle in the picture took about 5 seconds. It still just beat me in Othello. Damn. Also note the cool EPROM programmer. Somehow modern computers don't have those anymore.


Now here is an exception to my first answer, the only switch with complicated mechanics.
The caps lock switch is a locking switch.
It's not really very complicated. Works like some ball-point pens. The added pressure from the mechanic must have been the reason that it kept sticking. Some grease helped. Also visible in the picture, eww.

caps lock slider

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caps lock housing

DSC01734capslockhousing.JPG (267.09 KiB) Viewed 13944 times

[Icarium]

...I was just surprised by the good wikipedia article on honeywell switches but it turns out it was mostly written by webwit and HaaTa.

No, wait...it gets better..I just confused the deskthority wiki with wikipedia.

[7bit]

You should make a good photo of the ESCOM logo on that disk sleeve. Would be perfect for the ESCOM wiki article!

Also, I like how the keyboard is 7BIT-layout-ready, if there where only enough switches and key caps!

[Icarium]

You should make a good photo of the ESCOM logo on that disk sleeve. Would be perfect for the ESCOM wiki article!

Also, I like how the keyboard is 7BIT-layout-ready, if there where only enough switches and key caps!

I know! It's begging for more thumb action, right?
I need to find keycaps. I have about 10 more switches but no keycaps, especially not double width. :/

[ripster]

Nice pics, similiar to ALPS and Cherry MX locking switches.

http: //geekhack.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=40479

http: //geekhack.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=24480

[7bit]

Nice pics, similiar to ALPS and Cherry MX locking switches.

...

The Cherry MX lock switches are totally different!

[HaaTa]

Very cool!

Yeah, definitely Honeywell switches. Though I'd be very interested in the actual year they are from.

And wasn't there a keyboard I saw recently that used switches similar to these...




Another Honeywell Hall Effect keyboard incoming for me, with apparently some different variants of the switch .
Including a locking key. Pics when I can find the time to clone myself...

[woody]

What's this "home computer" like? A copy or down-scaled version of some existing at that time machine, repurposed PCBs from their day jobs, or their own design?

[nathanscribe]

I like that you think it's mundane that your dad built a home computer. It looks like great fun, and nicely made too!

[ripster]

Tell him happy Father's day, my kid is still sleeping!

http://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/v ... r_me_more/

Edit: It is noon. He awaketh.

[off]

ALL doubleshot keys used to be shiny in the old days. Never seemed to bother millions of faster typists than us.
http://deskthority.net/photos-videos-f8 ... t2806.html

Actually, those acorn electron caps are not shiny on the tops, just the sides- the tops have quite the structure to it (meaning your standard type of grit, just more/thicker).