The moment my cousin introduced me to his custom mechanical keyboard, I knew I had to have one for myself.
The early days of mechanical keyboards
My first mechanical keyboard I ever bought was the Cooler Master CM Storm Quickfire Rapid with Cherry MX Red switches. It was the cheapest one I could afford back in 2012 at $60 USD. It was pretty basic, but it had everything that I needed. It had a broken left Alt key, but I didn’t really mind. It was my first “high end” peripheral at the time and it served me well all the way from 2012 to 2019.
The keyboard didn’t die, but I got tired of using the same thing for 7 straight years that I completely pulled it apart and customized pretty much everything about it. More on it later!
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Discovering the Mechanical Keyboard community
Who knew there were this many people into mechanical keyboards? I was introduced to mech keyboards by my cousin, who I saw was working on his build at the time. He showed me was a “Holy Panda” was and how heavy his board was. The moment I press the key and picked up his board, I knew I had to have one.
The r/MechanicalKeyboards subreddit is huge! I didn’t even know this huge community existed for mere keyboards. I learned a lot just browsing around on that subreddit.
I have to warn you though, PLEASE be wary before going to that subreddit. It’s a pretty addictive and has an elitist culture so you can get roped in easily. I quickly learned that the mechanical keyboard hobby can get VERY pricey.
My KBD67 mk. II
This keyboard is my prized board. It’s not the most expensive board with the nicest parts, but I love it. This board is the KBD67mk2 kit from KBFans. It’s really heavy and is super solid. No rattles or shakes as I’m typing!
It has the Muted keycap set from KpRepublic. I really liked the GMK Muted set, but I’m not willing to shell out $300+ for that… Like I said before, this hobby is NOT CHEAP. So I settled for a knock-off version from China. They keycaps feel pretty good to me so I’m happy with it!
I populated the board with Holy Mint Pandas. I got the YOK Mint Panda switches from NovelKeys and the Halo Trues from Massdrop. I lubed them with Krytox G203. I also clipped the stem of the Halo True to give it a deeper bottom out and thunkier sound. Some may accuse me of treason for doing such a thing, but I like it!
My favorite part of the board is that it’s HEAVY. I have yet to see a person not taken aback by how heavy my board is when I show it to them. It’s got a huge brass weight screwed into the bottom and a brass plate to hold the switches. Everything else is milled aluminum.
I also love how the PCB is hotswappable, meaning I can change out the switches any time I’d like without soldering and de-soldering them one by one. It gives me the freedom to go with whatever I’m feeling at the time!
I pulled apart my CM Storm Quickfire Rapid
I completely mutilated my Quickfire Rapid because I got bored of it. I also wanted to find a way to fix the broken Alt key. I took it apart but couldn’t figure out why the Alt key was broken. The diode and trace looked good to me, but I was stumped. I decided to totally remake the board using the Phantom TKL PCB and Teensy 2.0 using QMK firmware.
I spray painted the entire case white and spray painted the plate teal. I don’t know why but teal and white always draw my attention. I guess I found my new favorite colors haha.
I kept the stock Cherry MX Red switches since they all worked just fine. I didn’t want to throw out perfectly functional switches for nothing!
I also bought TaiHao keycaps to go with the build. Looks pretty good to me!
I wanted the board to have USB-C, so I bought a micro USB to USB-C cable to connect the Teensy 2.0 to my computer. Unfortunately I had nowhere to put the USB-C port, so I had to dremel out a hole in the case. This part was pretty painful since I’m essentially destroying the Quickfire Rapid’s case. The cut looked absolutely terrible, so I had to 3D print out a USB-C cover to hide the mess I made. I think it turned out alright.
My first mechanical keyboard
This was the first keyboard I ever built ever since learning about them. It’s a GMMK TKL which includes a hotswappable and RGB PCB. I find the convenience of hotswap incredibly useful so that I have the freedom to go with whatever switches I want.
I went with the Zealios V2 67g switches. On first impression, I thought they were pretty heavy once it was all populated on my board. The heavy spring in combination with the INCREDIBLY tactile bump made for a pretty jarring typing experience in my opinion. My Holy Pandas are also 67g but they don’t feel as bad since their tactile bump isn’t as harsh as the Zeals. I ended up swapping out all the springs of the Zealios V2 to 62g and they feel great! I also lubed them with Krytox G203.
I finished the board off with the Ducky Skyline keycaps which are doubleshot PBT. I didn’t want anything super flashy since this will be my keyboard I use at work.
I wish I could take pictures of it, but my office at work is currently totally off limits due to the COVID situation. But as soon as I can get my hands back on it, I’ll definitely update this with pics!