I've had this IBM 3101 for a couple of years now, got it on eBay for under $200 back then, and always planned on restoring it. I figured lockdown would be the perfect opportunity to finally get around to it!
A view of the keyboard assembly with the case removed. Heavy corrosion.
The underside of the assembly
The leftover gunk from the broken down foam and adhesive. You can really see how bad the corrosion disassembled
Model and date codes. Looks like it's from 82'!
Soaking the keycaps to get rid of the decades of grime
Keycaps washed and dying, looking very sharp!
Newly painted switch plate! Rust and corrosion was grinded away and painted with some matte paint. Looks pretty good!
The hardest part of this restoration was disassembly. The switches were so corroded I needed to drown them in WD40 and pull on them with vice grips
Switch reassembly! Took a few days to scrub all the plastic parts and clean off the remaining WD40
All the switches cleaned, and assembled!
Both plates are now painted to protect from more corrosion
3101 case with all the old and flaky paint stripped
Testing out two kinds of foam density, the bottom one worked much better, giving a better click
Starting to punch the holes for the switches, using a marker as a guide
New foam with all the switch holes punched out
Some switches didn't return properly due to not being pushed against the foam enough
Side profile of the inner assembly
Totally restored inner assembly, just waiting on the cerakoted case
Original case back from being Cerakoted in H-112 COBALT
Main assembly mounted in the new case
The finished product with the IBM badge back in!
Sound test of the restored assembly:
https://imgur.com/udpk4AP
Now just waiting on a new beamspring controller to finally start using it for my CS classes
