Cherry Corp MX Keycap History

sixty · 05 Feb 2011, 07:15

After two hours of sleep, I return to present a bit of Cherry Corp. history.
Only official Cherry keys, no third party molds.

Double Shot

Sublimation

Laser

Other

I miss white blank PBTs. Other than that I am pretty sure I have every single keycap they ever made.

keyboardlover · 05 Feb 2011, 07:29

Great photos! Impressive. Would you be willing to sell any one-off doubleshot colored keys?

sixty · 05 Feb 2011, 07:30

keyboardlover wrote:Great photos! Impressive. Would you be willing to sell any one-off doubleshot colored keys?

I believe I have a spare yellow one, no guarantees though. May have traded it off by now. I'll check tonight.

ynih · 05 Feb 2011, 09:16

These are beautiful photos...are these taken with SLR and off camera Flash?

sixty · 05 Feb 2011, 09:24

ynih wrote:These are beautiful photos...are these taken with SLR and off camera Flash?

Thanks! Yep, DSLR and no flash. Sadly I only have a pretty lame lense and struggle with the focus most of the time. I shot these here in the office with one of these photo lamps and my mousepad as the background surface.

lootbag · 05 Feb 2011, 12:14

Cherry keycaps are the best.
The thick walls reduce the noise generated when bottoming out.
The "H" series, specifically the black on beige doubleshots, are very high contrast which I prefer as well.

Made an immediate difference the second I put them on my Ducky 1087 (which is now sold).
I need a new Cherry MX based keyboard!
If only a tenkeyless Cherry MX Red/Clear existed.

noctua · 05 Feb 2011, 12:23

Personally, I like these vintage keycaps, what a pity, these are no longer produced..
Maybe some keyboards with these keycaps still exist..?

burr · 05 Feb 2011, 13:28

These photos are really good, great work. I think it's the first time I've seen the spherical caps, they are quite nice.
What board was the white on gray color variant cap on? Did the whole board have those caps or was it just a couple of keys?

sixty · 05 Feb 2011, 17:14

burr wrote:These photos are really good, great work. I think it's the first time I've seen the spherical caps, they are quite nice.
What board was the white on gray color variant cap on? Did the whole board have those caps or was it just a couple of keys?

They are from the legendary Dolch portable computer!

7bit · 05 Feb 2011, 18:10

What makes you think that they will have discontinued all currently produced key caps by 2012?

sixty · 05 Feb 2011, 18:13

7bit wrote:What makes you think that they will have discontinued all currently produced key caps by 2012?

I can always update my files

To stay on that topic though. I'm pretty sure they will ditch the black thick POM ones at some point in the future, dunno if already next year or later. Too thick man.

daedalus · 05 Feb 2011, 18:41

lootbag wrote:Cherry keycaps are the best.

Well, they're the best for Cherry switches. Far more impressive ones elsewhere...

Moogle Stiltzkin · 18 Feb 2011, 16:54

I uploaded some pictures from ebay showing close ups of the Cherry beige/white dye sublimated keycaps. I managed to get a set for myself at a good price. So i'll be using these instead of Sixty's double shots, and then mix it with my patch kit project

Minskleip · 18 Feb 2011, 21:34

Moogle Stiltzkin wrote:I uploaded some pictures from ebay showing close ups of the Cherry beige/white dye sublimated keycaps. I managed to get a set for myself at a good price. So i'll be using these instead of Sixty's double shots, and then mix it with my patch kit project

Would you be interested in parting with sixty's?

Magna224 · 06 Mar 2011, 06:08

I heard that I have dye sub keycaps which is awesome because I thought I had laser. Sweeet.

keyboardlover · 06 Mar 2011, 13:42

Magna224 wrote:I heard that I have dye sub keycaps which is awesome because I thought I had laser. Sweeet.

Can you post closeup photos of one the keycaps, front and back?

Taeyoung · 09 Mar 2011, 08:45

Sixty,
Thanks to great photos with the explanation of Cherry Corp MX Keycap history.
I've post this article and your photos to KBDMania.
If that is a problem, please let me know and I'll remove the post on KBDMania.

sixty · 09 Mar 2011, 17:14

Taeyoung wrote:Sixty,
Thanks to great photos with the explanation of Cherry Corp MX Keycap history.
I've post this article and your photos to KBDMania.
If that is a problem, please let me know and I'll remove the post on KBDMania.

Sure, you are welcome to do so

Feel free to translate any other articles you find of interest in the future!

NewGuy · 09 Mar 2011, 18:17

That first image with the cream keys and brown lettering looks amazing.

Something I was wondering - on all the keycaps there is a gap between the stem and the "top" of the caps, often with a + around them. Has anyone ever filled in that space? It seems like it might help dampen the noise of the keys a bit.

sixty · 09 Mar 2011, 18:43

NewGuy wrote:That first image with the cream keys and brown lettering looks amazing.

Something I was wondering - on all the keycaps there is a gap between the stem and the "top" of the caps, often with a + around them. Has anyone ever filled in that space? It seems like it might help dampen the noise of the keys a bit.

I think a Japanese guy filled his Realforce caps with clay. Results were abysmal. Ripster might still have the link to the pics somewhere.

Taeyoung · 10 Mar 2011, 08:45

sixty wrote:
Taeyoung wrote:Sixty,
Thanks to great photos with the explanation of Cherry Corp MX Keycap history.
I've post this article and your photos to KBDMania.
If that is a problem, please let me know and I'll remove the post on KBDMania.
Sure, you are welcome to do so
Feel free to translate any other articles you find of interest in the future!

Cool! Thanks.

NewGuy · 10 Mar 2011, 10:31

sixty wrote:
NewGuy wrote:That first image with the cream keys and brown lettering looks amazing.

Something I was wondering - on all the keycaps there is a gap between the stem and the "top" of the caps, often with a + around them. Has anyone ever filled in that space? It seems like it might help dampen the noise of the keys a bit.
I think a Japanese guy filled his Realforce caps with clay. Results were abysmal. Ripster might still have the link to the pics somewhere.

Well, clay wouldn't have been my first choice, but that's disappointing to hear. Then again, someone would probably be manufacturing a keyboard like that from the factory if it worked.

I do wonder why there aren't any keyboards with foam or rubber surrounding the switches. It would shorten the travel distance, but should help dampen the noise of keys bottoming out. (or is the idea to simply avoid bottoming out altogether?)

ripster · 10 Mar 2011, 17:48

This is when I realized Silencium was crazy.

Speaking of Crazy.... Real Geeks Have Microscopes and beat up little kids for their Lego

Actually TIL that Das 2 keys were POM. Always assumed they were PBT. Those damn PBT Shrinkage Dimples!

ripster · 10 Mar 2011, 18:16

Oh yeah, almost forgot.

WHAT is this Cherry Corp Ricercar SPOS key made of and HOW is it made?

Helvetica makes Ripster feel Hipster.

I will accept definitive answers from the Mighty Oracle or lesser mortals.

sixty · 10 Mar 2011, 18:20

I asked a Korean friend once, he expects its lasering and then "evened" out by heating the keys up again. Cherry Germany knows nothing about it, besides that all their keys are POM.

ripster · 10 Mar 2011, 18:30

Hmmm...."Heating it up again"?

Usually the texture is applied by the mold at the injection stage.

Cracks me up Cherry Germany knows nothing about it.

RiGS · 01 Dec 2011, 21:03

As far as I can see the latest cherry lasered keys are thinner.
However some of the stabilized keys are thick, though I'm not sure about the spacebar.
I wonder if the spacebar is thicker than the rest of those keys.
Is there anyone who can confirm this?
Also is it made of PBT as well?

Findecanor · 01 Dec 2011, 21:32

The thickness of the space bar is somewhere in-between the thickness of the thin keys and the thick stabilized keys.
The light lasered space bars that I have (7 unit, 6.0 unit) are PBT.

No black Cherry Corp space bar is PBT. I have a 6.0 unit space bar from a more recent black double-shot ABS set -- with the text >PBT< in it, and it fails the acetone test, indicating that it is not PBT!
It was just made from the same mold as PBT space bars. A curious detail is that when I compare it to a light grey PBT space bar from what is otherwise the same type of keyboard, the space bar that is really PBT is 1.5 mm less wide! (measured with calipers)

RiGS · 01 Dec 2011, 21:52

Does that spacebar from your DS set have the same thickness as the light lasered one?

Findecanor wrote:A curious detail is that when I compare it to a light grey PBT space bar from what is otherwise the same type of keyboard, the space bar that is really PBT is 1.5 mm shorter! (measured with calipers)

You mean like that?

ripster · 02 Dec 2011, 02:50

No black Cherry Corp space bar is PBT. I have a 6.0 unit space bar from a more recent black double-shot ABS set -- with the text >PBT< in it, and it fails the acetone test, indicating that it is not PBT!

Damn. That sounds like something the Chinese would do.

ClickClacks aren't ABS btw. Not sure what they are.