Need advice on opening Alps SKCC switches

[purdobol]

Anybody know a good way to open Alps SKCC Side-Angled Cream switches?
Just spent almost 30 minutes opening one switch. Scratching switchplate in the proscess...
It'll be nightmare to clean the whole board

I know it's a long shot but maybe someone figure out what to put in those 4 slits while puling the housing up.

[Daniel Beardsmore]

My approach for SKCC is to use tweezers to lever up the flap on one side, and then insert my trusty old Pritt Stick Cool-Rule so that the flap can't close, and then lever up the flap on the other side:



(This image is from the Disassembly section on the [wiki]Alps SKCC series[/wiki] wiki page.)

[purdobol]

Opened second one and damaged housing in the process. Not going to try another one from the top. Glad that this board has 2 dummy switches so no harm done.
Seems like desoldering is the only sane option.

Thanks for how-to. Will try your solution. Hopefully without damaging any more switches.

[Daniel Beardsmore]

Wait, you have a keyboard with those switches in? That may be the first time that has ever been seen. The good news is that a shop in Sweden has them NOS, and several of us bought them (I still have spares). I'm curious why the keystem is so different: [wiki]General Instrument Series S950[/wiki] has angled switches in the form you'd expect, without needing a different keycap mount (but it's the Clare-Pendar keycap mount, not the SKCC mount).

I've never heard of anyone opening those switches without de-soldering. They're not easy to open even de-soldered — I've already broken one.

[rich1051414]

I just shove tweezers in from the side, and let the wedge shape of the tweezers do the work for me.

[Daniel Beardsmore]

Be careful, the flaps snap easily!

[purdobol]

Wait, you have a keyboard with those switches in?

Yeah. It's on facit typewriter similar to the one Haata posted way back photos-videos-f64/facit-8111-2-typewriter-t12424.html. Which also had unusual mount and same caps. Gorgeous caps by the way
Maybe that's the reason for unusual mount. The caps I mean. It would be easier and cheaper to make one mould just for the slider instead of creating new ones for every single letter. For what looks like in house made caps (didn't see those anywhere else).





More thorough pics soon. Have to check if this thing works first. Cable is missing and it was dropped in transport, keyboard housing cracked in few places. So need to glue this back together.

[Daniel Beardsmore]

Super sausage dog!

Right, that explains everything. Facit is Swedish, so the ones for sale in Sweden are typewriter spares. It also explains why the two spares are SKCC and SKFF, which are both used in these typewriters.

[nevin]

Wait, you have a keyboard with those switches in?

Yeah. It's on facit typewriter similar to the one Haata posted way back photos-videos-f64/facit-8111-2-typewriter-t12424.html. Which also had unusual mount and same caps. Gorgeous caps by the way
Maybe that's the reason for unusual mount. The caps I mean. It would be easier and cheaper to make one mould just for the slider instead of creating new ones for every single letter. For what looks like in house made caps (didn't see those anywhere else).



More thorough pics soon. Have to check if this thing works first. Cable is missing and it was dropped in transport, keyboard housing cracked in few places. So need to glue this back together.

that's downright gorgeous! ...oh, the possibilities....