A Geek Goes Flying

I was getting unintended double-input on the space bar on my blacked-out “Mac symbols” Tokyo60 (with the Kailh Box Hako Royal Clear switches ), so I decided to swap the spring with one from a Kailh Box Navy ( I made the same swap on a Durock Silent Shrimp used under the space bar on another keyboard , with great effect). The first swap was simple. This one, not as much; the switch sort of fell apart when I opened it, so I pulled another apart to see how to put it back together. To my astonishment, I got it right the first time; the switch is back working, and nicely stiff now. Yay for decent tools. Opened the Navy switch first to harvest its spring. See that little green thing in the switch housing? Not where it’s supposed to be. Another switch opened; that’s where that green thing is supposed to be... It gets sandwiched between the white plastic bit and the housing. Like this. Used this tool to put it back where it belonged.

Navy switch opened I built a Tokyo 60 using the Durock T1 Silent Shrimp switches and the Drop+Matt3o /dev/tty MT3 keycaps (with Apple kit, natch). I like it a lot, as a silent tactile board, but I was getting the occasional, annoying, double-space-bar activation and/or, just by grazing the space bar, inadvertent actuation. At least one reviewer has encountered issues with “weak springs” with this switch and their solution was to swap in a Cherry MX Clear spring. Me being me, I decided to swap in a spring from one of the several Kailh Box Navy switches I have surplus. I’ve never done this before. I found this switch opener tool , which was advertised to work with Kailh switches, and confirmed it would also work with the Durock. This YouTube video shows just how easy it is; literally just position the switch on the opener and then press down. Pop, off comes the top. Couldn’t have been easier. And the Frankenswitch works exactly as I’d hoped: The spacebar requires just enough effort...