This is undoubtably a nutty hack I came up with tonight because I couldn’t decide whether to use 3204 and 205g0 on fresh batch of Holy Pandas intended for upcoming Polaris.
Background: I already have three Holy Panda boards, lubed w/3203, 3204, and 205g0. I enjoy all three but 205g0 board is getting the lion share of use. For Polaris, I wanted something between 3204 and 205g0: smoother than 3204 but more tactile and clacky than 205g0.
The nutty answer I came up with is to lube one side with 3204 and the other with 205g0. I’ll need to build a board full of these and use them for a least a week to confirm but the one switch I lubed and tested feels pretty close to what I wanted.
UPDATE: Actual lubes used are 204g0 (on the left-side) and 205g0S (on the right-side) from StoreUni. Switch orientation is South-facing.
Sorry. Came back to explain why I think this hack works. The hack is based on my previous attempt to recreate the Holy Panda feel using BSUN housing. BSUn’s contact leaf was weaker than Panda housing so, after a lot of tinkering, I found that placing a piece of rubberband behind on just one of the two contact leafs enhanced contact leaf close to Holy Panda.
I was worried that asymmetry would ruin the feel but it didn’t. Best explanation I could fabricate was that MX switch housing would re-distribute the difference between the two leafs. Same effect is used in this hack.
Frankly, I’m rather surprised by the result. 3204 results in a lively but shallow feel (Korean description is 경박) and 205g0 feels silky but submerged (묵직?) and deadened/bassy sound. Later is enjoyable but I like variations. Combining the two in my own fashion results in a rather classy solid yet lively feel with delightful acoustics that doesn’t sound cheap. If you’re into tinkering, I highly recommend giving this hack a try.
This is all very interesting! Where can I buy different types of lube? I only have the dwindling remains of 3204 and a nearly full bottle of 205g0 (which I’m gonna dip into for lubing my HHKB Type-S into absolute silence) from Switchmod, and I want to try different types of lube and different consistencies and see how they change feels.
EDIT: Also, I’m looking for a good spring lube. I’ve thought about experimenting with Victorionox lubricating oil, but I know that there’s a lot of difference in what people use. Are any of the Krytox oils from StoreUni fit for that?
Hey Lesbian! StoreUni is a good place to get a lot of different types of lube. 3204 is 204g0, so you can always pick that up from StoreUni. It depends on how dampened you like your springs; I tend to use whatever lube I’m using for the rest of the switch, but a lot of people also like to use the oils to lube their springs, and Walker uses what appears to be a dielectric grease spray in a tub.
3204 and 205g0 are, from what I’ve seen with doing work for a few customers, quite different in consistency and application on the different parts of the switch. Both work totally fine for springs but it’s a bit more tedious if you’re not going to bag or tub lube.
This is all very interesting! Where can I buy different types of lube? I only have the dwindling remains of 3204 and a nearly full bottle of 205g0 (which I’m gonna dip into for lubing my HHKB Type-S into absolute silence) from Switchmod, and I want to try different types of lube and different consistencies and see how they change feels.
I got the lubes used in this hack from StoreUni. 204g0 is tad thicker than 3204 but feels the same. 205g0 was also slightly thicker and seemed to separate faster so I got 205g0S which should be closer to what SwitchMod sells. It also didn’t separate as fast after through remixing.
For springs, I was using Victorinox but now I use VPF 1514 which StoreUni also sells. FYI, shipment from StoreUni to US-CA took ~2wks.
I’ve got a lot of 205g0 from Switchmod so I’m glad to hear mine shouldn’t separate as fast; my 205g2 and 105g0 I mix together and use for lubing my topre boards. After about 8 months of heavy use at work I’m gonna have to relube, but I also want to domeswap so getting two birds stoned at once.
StoreUni keeps a very open line of communication so he’s quite easy to get a hold of, and if you have any questions needing to be answered about the properties of lubricant, oils, and greases, he can answer them.
What SHOULD I use on my Topre? I’m looking for something that doesn’t take out all of the tactility but still silences the board fairly well - I took some Finish Line PFPE and dielectric grease to the stabilizers, which was really nice, and this second-hand HHKB Type-S BT (LLC, Esq.) has some sort of lube on the sliders, but I can’t tell what it is at all. I was thinking about taking my Switchmod 205g0 to it, but if there’s anything better that keeps it nice and whisper-quiet, I’ll take that for sure.
Will Christo-Lube work well for keeping it quiet? Also, I heard someone mentioning a possible quieting solution of applying a thin coat to the PCB/spring, but I have no idea if that’s just a reaction to the mondo crunchy springs in some of the newer rounds of Leopold F-XXXC boards. Any way that the lubes could screw with the capacitance, or is that an interesting thing to try?
Yes but only moderately with 111 and 112. 129 reduces noise a lot more but switches will feel more sluggish like 205g0. OTOH, As to 205g0, it didn’t reduce much noise for me. YMMV.
I don’t think so. When I accidentally left some GPL 105 smudges on HHKB PCB, keys in that area stopped working until I went back and removed all trace of the oil. This is why I no longer use oil to lube HHKB, just grease.
Finally built a full board of HP lubed with 204.5g. No surprises. Switches in use feel very close to what I wanted: 3204’s tactility with 205g0’s silky smooth feel. I like it. If you try it, be sure to give all the switches a rigorous workout after lubing then let it rest for a day or two for the lube to settle in before using.
Have you tried using 205g0S for the stabs? How does it feel compared to the 205g0 that you used?
I was about to get 205g0 from store uni as well. but seeing how you mentioned that 205g0S didn’t separate as fast as 205g0, made me wanna opt for the 205g0S instead.
Have you tried using 205g0S for the stabs? How does it feel compared to the 205g0 that you used?
Only on the parts holding the wire since sluggishness don’t matter much there. I lube the rest using Christo-Lube.
I was about to get 205g0 from store uni as well. but seeing how you mentioned that 205g0S didn’t separate as fast as 205g0, made me wanna opt for the 205g0S instead.
205g0S is definitely less hassle to use but it’s not clear if less separation is from 205g0S itself or because of the extra churning by the vendor to make 205g0S out of 205g0 and 105 mix.
Lubing only one-side of the stem or even just partially with 205g0 is now part of my bag of tricks. What it does is makes the switch quieter, lower pitched, and smoother at the cost of slight sluggishness. As long as the direction of the area lubed with 205g0 is vertical, along the axis stem moves, there shouldn’t be much problem with different types of Krytox lube mixing.
The trick comes in handy quieting a few switches on a board making unpleasantly loud sound. This is fairly common on tray-mounted boards.