I was initially excited about my Keychron V6 keyboard, I was looking forward to a thockier keyboard and wanted the customizability with qmk. The V6 seemed like a good match. But after unboxing it, I realized that the south-facing LEDs weren’t ideal. I had just purchased Razer PBT keycaps, which I loved, but they didn’t work at all with the LEDs and the escaping light underneath just blinded me.
I tried to make the setup work with custom keycaps from fkcaps (https://fkcaps.com/custom/5ELZPQ). While they were cool, they weren’t the same as double-shot PBT keys. The setup wasn’t ideal but I just stuck with it.
When I saw a YouTube video about building a keyboard with KiCad, I was inspired to try it myself. I used an ATmega32U, because I thought it would be easier to integrate, but it did have it’s challenges: limited I/O meant I had to sacrifice the layout switch, and my matrix is best described as “tortuous”. Despite a few errors on my PCB (a group of LEDs were not connected and I completely missed the holes for a stabilizer), the final PCB works amazingly well.
I’ve added a few photos below showcasing my setup before PCB assembly. You can see the light issues under the keys and how the laser etching from fkcaps isn’t very durable.
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Wait, how did you have the physical PCB? 3d Printed?
There are a number of relatively inexpensive PCB fabrication services available online, that is if all the YouTube sponsorship ads forced in to every channel I watch are to be believed.
Yes, I got it made at jlcpcb. It’s a big board, so it wasn’t as cheap as a small prototype board. But not unreasonable. A good price per board, but a bit of a waste because I now have 4 more that I will never use.
There are services like https://jlcpcb.com/ that fab one-off PCB’s surprisingly cheaply.
What about the matrix, “Japanese” duplex or something?
Super cool! Great job. That’s the one thing that bothers me about their boards. Maybe I’ll give this a shot too
It was a fun process, much recommended. I’ve got an extra 4 pcbs that require a few bodge wires if you’ve got a V6. :D
Any chance you’d release these files? I might wanna try this too. I miss my shine through keys.
Yes, I want to, just haven’t gotten around to put it all together yet. But it’s on my to do list.
I got a V5 and feel like I got tricked by the “backlit” thing not meaning shinethrough
Yeah, the LEDs on my Q6 are the only thing I don’t like about it. I don’t use it in the dark much, but I’ve gotten used to the shine through letters on laptops, so I wish it was the same.
