Need help on building complete custom keyboard

[Retinaizer]

Hello dear enthusiasts,
I'm new to Deskthority and mechanical keyboard world in general, but I've fallen in love with mechanical keyboards lately and I really wanna build one a completely custom one for myself. I study as electrical engineer and I'm graduating soon. As part of my bachelor diploma work I decided to build a mechanical keyboard with some added functionalities such as(these are just ideas and I dont really know how hard they would be to implement so take it with a grain of salt) fully programmable OLED display that shows some information such as room temperature and humidity plus maybe option to be used as a calculator, temp and humidity sensors as stated before, maybe a bluetooth module etc. I have all these ideas and i dont know where to start... Well I'll probably use old cheap mechanical keyboard for switches, plate & stuff and get a atmega(?) chip to program but I don't know what program to use how to implement all those addons and stuff. I'm little bit familiar with programming chips but not that comfortable so if there are programming experts or people who did such things before and willing to give me any kind of advice/help I would deeply appreciate it.

P.S. English is my third language so I might've made some grammatical and structural errors while I was writing this post and I'm sorry for that.

[Blaise170]

Definitely possible. Take a look at this one.

https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=94959.0

[purdobol]

Best approach would be to choose a chip you want to use. For example atmega32u4 is popular and well tested, teensy offers more pins so it is an option too. Then make sure you know how to connect 2 or more of those chips together (i2c for example). One as a master and rest as slaves, because it's pretty much certain you'll run out of available pins with so many addons.

And then just build the thing step by step. Working keyboard first, then add a screen for example, modyfing firmware to support it. With both working you can introduce the calculator function, wchich will require either an external switch to get into "calculator mode" or some key combination. Again firmware modification. And all the other modules you want to include.

Probably don't have to tell you to make sure every sensor and module drains as little power as possible if we're talking no external power supply or multiple power sources. Bluetooth will require battery, so charging module will be required etc.

Some useful links for a start:
workshop-f7/brownfox-step-by-step-t6050.html
workshop-f7/how-to-build-your-very-own- ... t7177.html

Generally workshop part of this forum is a goldmine of information. Well worth reading.
Good luck and have fun with the project

[Retinaizer]

Best approach would be to choose a chip you want to use. For example atmega32u4 is popular and well tested, teensy offers more pins so it is an option too. Then make sure you know how to connect 2 or more of those chips together (i2c for example). One as a master and rest as slaves, because it's pretty much certain you'll run out of available pins with so many addons.

And then just build the thing step by step. Working keyboard first, then add a screen for example, modyfing firmware to support it. With both working you can introduce the calculator function, wchich will require either an external switch to get into "calculator mode" or some key combination. Again firmware modification. And all the other modules you want to include.

Probably don't have to tell you to make sure every sensor and module drains as little power as possible if we're talking no external power supply or multiple power sources. Bluetooth will require battery, so charging module will be required etc.

Some useful links for a start:
workshop-f7/brownfox-step-by-step-t6050.html
workshop-f7/how-to-build-your-very-own- ... t7177.html

Generally workshop part of this forum is a goldmine of information. Well worth reading.
Good luck and have fun with the project

Thanks for all this information, really helped me with the startpoint

[Retinaizer]

Definitely possible. Take a look at this one.

https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=94959.0

Thanks will take a look at this

[chuckdee]

There's actually a few threads on building keyboards from scratch here also. That's how I got my start. Though a smaller keyboard might not be practical for everyday use, they are portable, and easier to get your mind around for a first project, so you might consider that route.

I cut my teeth on a project on this board: workshop-f7/kb45p-45-prototype-board-al ... 12896.html

That PCB is no longer available to my knowledge, but you might find something similar. They do have the let's split, iris, and many other from the ground projects for smaller keyboards. https://keeb.io/ sells a lot of them.