类型: IC
作者: punkonjunk
发布时间: 2017-02-20
00:37:26
更新时间: 2017-02-20 00:37:26
原链接:
https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=87767.0
Hi!
So I recently started making keycaps in december. I
tend to turn everything up to 11, and this satisfied a ton
of my desires - playing with goopy stuff, making small
plastic things that are as fun as legos, saving money, and
doing something no one else is doing. I quickly ramped up to
a complete keycap mold of some SA grab bag stuff, and then
did these:
http://imgur.com/gallery/RKumX
- gold, metallic red, and black resin
http://imgur.com/gallery/eUJnn
- Pimento and Olive colorway, with floating legends. (I need
a better camera, that’s on the list)
As you can see,
these are bubbly. This is difficult to avoid, and with all
the experimentation, heat treating, etc, I can’t get bubbles
to go away completely. HOWEVER, all I need is a couple of
things - vacuum chamber, vacuum motor, and a pressure pot to
start doing this REALLY right, bubble free, clean designs
and good bottoms.
Right now, it costs about 700 bucks
to get most of a key set from hotkeys project. They are
beautiful keys (and obviously accidentally inspired me at
some point with the clear cappings) but that cost is
bananas. The heat treatment I’m doing makes these caps crazy
hard, and I can’t scratch them with PBT keycaps, so thats at
least a kind of scientific pointer that they are at least
about that hard.
I don’t want to do any crazy taking
orders super early - this is a rough IC, to get an idea of
how I should proceed from here. Equipment will be some
expense, so it’ll be a month or two before I start getting
ramped up.
As you can see, these are ROUGH. the first
set, gold and red, even has crooked caps. I shot the stems
and the clear part at once, but the stems I domed FAR too
high, which resulted in some being too tall, some being
crooked, etc. I worked this out in the second set
effectively, but bubbles and a rough bottom are still an
issue - this will be resolved rapidly with better molds, and
man, do I have a plan. a crazy plan. I’ll film it, because
it’s going to be awesome.
So, my plan will be, once I’m
assembled for production, and happy with my new method - I
will produce a set, then run an IC on that set specifically,
with pricing fixed, good photos (gotta get a good DSLR) and
any other options available. (I might offer a couple
colorways depending on how many runs I do at once)
I
plan to start with SA fully sculpted blanks, because that’s
what I like the most for keycap style, and because I just
spent 183 dollars on SA blanks with 7bit. (he was so helpful
and awesome with my specific needs)
So what do I want
to know now?
Any input you have - besides “those are
crooked and bubbly” (I know, fix is possible with better
equipment)
What would you pay for a set of these for a 40%, 60%, TKL
and 100% key set? Or, what would you expect them to
cost?
Do you like the idea of limited runs of keycaps, instead
of a giant pile of individually orderable keys?(Overruns/inevitable cancellations will be available for
sale afterwards, individually, on my website)
I like
this idea because 1: it’s awesome to type on, and lets me
offer something totally new, totally original, and I think a
lot of fun. Ideally, I’ll eventually also offer commissions
to help folks make their perfect endgame. I have plans for
mine - crystal clear caps with floating, cursive legends in
crimson, with embedded blood spatter on them.
Do you think colorways like this would sell? Weirder
stuff, or should I work on something closer to normal, or
closer to a clone of a popular colorway, IE carbon,
etc?
I really like the idea of opaque, but backlight
compatible keycaps in fun colors. But I could also see clear
or simple caps selling well, also.