I own the grey Pyramid mk3 special edition and really, really love it but I could not gel with the pads; they felt heavy and not tactile enough for fluid programming notes or playing live. So I decided to replace the pads with some low profile Kailh Choc Silver V1 mechanical key switches. This turned out to be a real challenge, but I’m very, very happy with the results! Here’s a brief description of the challenges:
Designing and lasercut a mounting plate for the key switches
Soldering the key switches to the main PCB
Finding the right transparant keycaps (soon available at MoErgo.com). I have found other square ‘black frosted’ transparant keycaps from Chosfox but I’m not sure if I like them over the white convex translucent POM keycaps which are not square and a little bigger.
I have two spare lasercut mounting plates in both black and white POM if anyone is interested. Please send me a DM if you are interested! I will add details of the build later.
I want to order the black and white 1U MBK convex POM keycaps from MoErgo but the 1U convex black are sold out and currently in production and need to wait unfortunately. Those Chosfox keycaps are also very nice especially when they are lit, but I want the original mk3 look.
The transculent white and black Convex POM keycaps I want are finally in transit from China and I will post new photo’s when received. I’m very excited about this project which I like to call the 'Squarp Pyramid V4".
Agreed! What a cool project. Excellent work. Can we get a video of it? I just want to hear what those buttons sound like and get an idea what the travel of a button press is like. It does look like there is a significant amount of light bleed from each illuminated button. Does this make it difficult to tell which button is illuminated and which isn’t?
I’ve made a video! If you are interested in doing this yourself: I have 2 or 3 mounting plates left and could guide you thru the process. It’s not difficult but you need serious soldering skills to keep it clean if you ever want to revert back to the original pads.
Thank you for the video! Those buttons have an incredibly satisfying “click!” Super cool project. The black keys look pretty difficult to see. Is there perhaps a translucent black/smoke clear color button available that might be a better fit? Do the REC and PLAY buttons still glow red and green? The light bleed doesn’t look as bad as I thought from the pictures… certainly not unmanageable.
All in all, this is a really cool project! Excellent work and kudos to you @hotswank! Well done! I have never soldered a thing in my life and can barely find time to mess around in my studio let alone learn how to solder and work up a project (#dadlife). If you ever decide you want to take on the work of doing this as a side hustle, let me know… I’d probably be interested in having mine moded.
Thank you again,
Michael
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Just looked back at the photos and noticed the REC and PLAY buttons glow red and green. Very cool!
Thank you for the kind words! The backlid black keys don’t have any real purpose anyway but you could change them for all whites, like the V1 and V2 are anyway. Like I said in my previous posts, there are only a few other options available (the Chosfox black frosted or normal transparant keycaps) and in hindsight perhaps even better, but I wanted the clean V3 look and not the ‘keyboard’ look… I will post pictures showing how they look later this week. I have the Lim. Grey Edition and those black frosted keycaps look very good and the normal not so much, don’t know how it will suit the normal black Pyramid’s though…
With the latter you will not have any problems with illumination because they lit up like a Christmas tree Night mode is highly recommended.
Re: the noise, I was banging them real hard, so in reality they sound way more subtle. Those switches are readily available but you really need the transparant ones.
I’m located in the Netherlands and interested to do this mod for you. Please send me a DM for more details.
Night mode is highly recommended.
