deskthority

The spacebars on IBM buckling spring keyboards are much longer than they need to be (at least for me). I have seen spacebar mods that transplant a Model M spacebar onto an AT. This is a step in the right direction, but I am wondering about the possibility of shrinking the spacebar drastically, so that it might shed its stabilizer wire for a peg and barrel or perhaps have no stabilizer at all. Thus, shrinking the spacebar could result in a simpler mechanism that would be smoother and quieter than the existing design.

I am thinking of a spacebar of similar size to that on the Japanese IBM keyboards, the Filco Minila, or even smaller. I have not tested this yet, but I think that an adequate spacebar (for me at least) could be somewhere between 1.50 and 2.75 units long; i.e., somewhere between the size of a standard Tab key and a standard ANSI right shift key. The size of a standard ANSI left shift or enter key might about about right.

Shrinking the spacebar on IBM buckling spring keyboards might be a futile exercise without being able to change the PCB and plate to provide additional actuation points so that the freed-up space could be used for additional modifiers. Nevertheless, with all the benefits and caveats in mind, it would be interesting to see your thoughts and designs.

That's exactly what I've been thinking about, for custom buckling springs. A nice tight 60% to sub TKL layout, with small space bar and no wire stabs anywhere. Finished off in shiny steel, I bet it would be a killer!

But buckling spring is as far off as custom Topre. We have a lot of work to do with these non-discrete switches. Custom cap sense PCBs are the start of it — and Xwhatsit's got the controller aced — but then there's all the individual switch mechanisms and the curved plates and case. We could use classic caps, or commission a few space bars from Unicomp… perhaps. I'm still waiting to see any progress from them on Emmer's next gen keyboard.

Nothing is impossible, but we're talking about something that is far from easy. I'm glad I've got my Kishsaver in the meantime!

Yep, short split spacebars are great (one for space, one for backspace, or Fn, or malt-layout E, or whatever). Even better is to add a couple of keys below the spacebars, one for each hand:


Or check out the Canon Cat with Jef Raskin’s “leap key” idea: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canon_Cat

Oooh! That ASCII board (whose legends are ironically so not ASCII!) is a nice design.

No key should be larger than 1.5 units!*


In fact, there should only be 2 key sizes: 1 and 1.5 units.*


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*) except for the 2 units keys for the top-rows

7bit wrote:No key should be larger than 1.5 units!*


In fact, there should only be 2 key sizes: 1 and 1.5 units.*

So, something this?


[Sorry to get off topic here... this design really doesn’t have much to do with buckling spring layouts. ]

The split board looks like a Tetris game in stereo. Nothing is irrelevant as far as I am concerned. Innovation comes from allowing minds to roam freely.

Before I got a replacement stabilizer wire from wcass for my Kishsaver, I had a Caps lock key on there. It was the biggest buckling spring keys that seemed stable.

prdlm2009 wrote:Before I got a replacement stabilizer wire from wcass for my Kishsaver, I had a Caps lock key on there. It was the biggest buckling spring keys that seemed stable.

Yes, for example on IBM Model M keyboards, keys with a strike surface larger than 1.50x are stabilized with a peg in an adjacent barrel with a stabilizer insert, and the spacebar has a stabilizer wire. A 1.50x spacebar would likely be too small, even for my taste, and so we would be looking at some kind of stabilized key, such as peg and barrel. This would entail adding a barrel to the left or right of the central barrel of the spacebar for use as a stabilizer.

Thanks, jacobolus, for the keyboard pics. I especially like the look of the ASkeyboard, although I would want an ANSI Enter key and could probably dispense with the two extra keys below the spacebar. I would also like to move the Right Shift 1x to the left and put a Fn key to the right of the Right Shift. It's interesting that the Alt key is in red.