PlacaFromHell's Space Invaders 3101 keyboard.

[PlacaFromHell]

Well, hi dudes I'm building a custom 3101-like keyboard using clicky Space Invaders from a 122 battleship. This is one of my biggest keyboard projects after my bolt moded model F XT. I always loved the layout of my IBM 3101, but because is heavy as fuck (and expensive too), I can't take it to another place just like that, I need something less cool but also less heavy and big.
Some history about the keyboard:
The last owner tried to clean it but it was a disaster, also he denied doing it and claimed that the keyboard was working, without even a compatible computer to try it. I calified him as "regular" and he got mad I really don't care, I got a buch of great switches for 25 U$D.

I started disassembling the keyboard with and found some broken switches, at least 20. Fortunately, some of them could be repaired. Desoldering is really easy when you have an air supply.

Spoiler:

Then, I started to work on the plate.

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The plate



And the plate Thanks dad!

All mounted, just to admire how cool this will be. I like it a lot, and the legends are so cool.

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Handwire or PCB, what do you think?

[spongebob1981]

Handwire.

A PCB that size would be quite hard to acquire, let alone print!
Also: with that many switches, bear in mind the chip you are going to use, you need a lot of pins there.
Subscribed!

esp: Cablealo a mano!
Una PCB de ese tamaño te va a salir un ojo de la cara, y va a ser dificilísima de quemar o imprimir. A mano te va a llevar una tarde y media.
Y de paso: cuidado que son muchos switches, necesitas un chip con muchos pines!

[Myoth]

yoooo that's super cool !!! I wish I was able to make such cool stuff (though I should try, before saying that )

I'm really looking forward to the next step of your project !!

[Findecanor]

Spoiler:

And the plate Thanks dad!

Did you glue the plate together with superglue? I'm afraid that won't hold. I have tried that with small pieces of plate and that did not work well.
If I were you, I would see if I could use put first a reinforcing metal bar along the top edge. Attach this with slow-curing epoxy (slower is stronger and more forgiving) and maybe also with a pair of bolts or rivets in each segment.
Also glue a piece of sturdy piece of sheet metal as reinforcement under the plate between the Insert and Cmd groups.
That is... unless you can weld it.

Some epoxy to fill the gaps would also not be bad, but a model putty can be sanded so would be more suitable as last step before sanding and paint.

Handwire or PCB, what do you think?

Can nothing of the PCB be reused? No diodes?

Also: with that many switches, bear in mind the chip you are going to use, you need a lot of pins there.

There are tricks for making fewer pins work with a larger matrix, but those are more difficult for direct wiring. A matrix goes more towards optimal the more it resembles a square.
I once planned doing a direct wiring job where I would wrap each logical matrix column to two physical columns, thus halving the columns and doubling the rows (but I found a PCB that fit my layout 95%, so I opted for that instead ...)
Another method is to use shift registers for the columns, in which case the columns would need only three pins on the microcontroller but you would need one 8-bit shift register for every eight columns. There are a bunch other techniques on that site also.

[PlacaFromHell]

I have the diodes but the PCB died. It's not glued, the plate is welded. Anyway I should put some extra reinforcements.
My Teensy will be here in a month, so be patient