This one emerged after I decided to clean my first mechanical keyboard Velocifire TKL02WS. It is a soldered board (unlike my most recent acquirement Keychron K8), and therefore simple cleaning turned into full-scale tuning process.

This is how the original $50 Velocifire looked like:

All-white 80% (my form-factor of choice) board, brown switches, white led backlight. It is definitely worth its cost, having been serving me for quite a while after its warranty. Now is time to make it less dull XD.

First I painted the covering metal plate and the hull with glossy anthracite. Great color, my favorite shade of gray :) Apart from the looks it had another point: the cover started showing small spots of rust.

Another aim of the tuning was to test a certain switch placement schematic that - judging by the result - I will most likely be keeping for my further crafting projects:

• The entering (Enter, Esc, Space and Backspace) and arrow keys get clicky blue switches.

• The ones I use as input modifiers (left Shift, left Alt, Win/Meta and CapsLck that I use as Ctrl) get soft red linear switches.

• Alpha/Numerics depend on the general placement of the board. Since I intended to drop this one in the office with (hopefully few) other people, they became yellow linear switches, to make less noise. I like both yellow and blue in fact (and have yet to taste green).

• The rest are Fn and other utility and page movement keys, and they got original brown switches. For the reason that they were all that I had left :) But they are fine where they are (even though I agree that browns are a joke).

All switches were lubed before soldering, of course! Then went the second pass of paint:

Followed by damper placement and assembly.

The yellow switches I used have yellow-ish transparent shell and colorize a white backlight. It made a nice resulting color scheme.

I don't have an inset for this board, since making it for myself. But I do have a mascot ship for it that reflects well my attitude for a renewed and beloved board (using it feels amazing): an AM-650 Ore Carrier that I made in MagicaCSG inspired by the Traveller's Arcturus Station module. Reliable workhorse of a proletarian spacer. Let it serve me well.

And I think I know why this hobby of crafting keyboards is so extremely popular. It is because, together with a pleasing result that is also a very useful tool, the process itself at its base is... quite simple actually.

Even with my mediocre soldering skills I've managed to perform the whole re-assembly over the course of several online ttRPG sessions, that is using only hand motorics - my mind was completely elsewhere at that time.