Ortholinear UHK mod

Modding
1

I was ordering a 3D print, and since all companies around here have minimum order price, I was left with quite a lot of “free” credit, so decided for this experiment.

Ordered a bunch of these:

ol3
ol31296×1728 90.8 KB

Insights:

  • Originally I thought the keys would wobble to the point of unusability, but actually, this has not turned out to be a problem.
  • Some extenders/keys are imperfectly alligned, leading to some keycaps rubbing against other keycaps, which produces an annoying sensation/sound.
  • I fear about the cross stem getting broken inside of the keycap slot, so I am mounting them from outside. The mounting is imperfect as I have badly guessed at diameters, so the keycaps are not perfectly oriented. The model definitely needs another iteration.
  • Bottom row default shift is 0.50, but the zigzag extenders all shift by 0.25 key, so the bottom row is still shifted by 0.25 of a key. A good compromise between true ortholinear and staggered, as I tend to make mistakes on a true ortholinear bottom row.
  • Upper row default shift is 0.75, so instead of shifting them -0.75, I shift them +0.25, so the top row is shifted by one key, which would be a problem for keymap compatibility if I used the top row for writing. Fortunately I don’t, so I don’t care.
  • I have ordered an insufficient number and broken quite a lot of the extenders, so my top row of the left half is not aligned at all. :sweat_smile:
  • The thumb clusters being lowered by a centimeter compared to the rest of the keyboard feels weird. I will have to get used to that yet.
4 Likes
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ol1
ol11728×1296 128 KB

2 Likes
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ol2
ol21728×1296 80.7 KB

1 Like
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Why not just using one of the ortolinear alternatives from the same price range (there are some options, afaik)?

5

You are quite missing the point. The point was the curiosity as to whether this would work.

But to answer your question literally:

  • Because I may not want to spend another 1400$. Especially I might not want to spend 1400$ on an experiment if I had no idea whether I want ortholinear or not.
  • Afaik UHK has still no competition when it comes to right side modules.
  • I don’t want to have to learn another customization alternative to UHK macros.
  • When it comes to advanced features, UHK’s smart macros seem much more user friendly than having to code stuff in C as in QMK.
  • I don’t want to have to maintain yet another keymap file for an incompatible firmware.
  • I value UHK features more than I value ortholinearity.
  • This took much less time than configuring yet another keyboard from scratch.
2 Likes
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:smiling_face_with_three_hearts:

Thanks for posting about this. It’s a cool mod, I think I want to try out too. I always felt ortholinearity would be my next step, but I am not confident I really want to go there. This seems to be a decent way to try it out.

I wonder if 0.5u shifts could also be realised (to bring the bottom row into full alignment).