Keyboard Builders' Digest / Projects
Colemak typewriter
u/bII6 converted an Olympia Splendid 66 typewriter to Colemak.
Published September 26, 2022
Took me an extended weekend to resolder the type slugs […] I didn't think this would succeed at all so I'm pretty happy with it but I'd like to give it another shot with another typewriter and more planing in the future – bII6.
So what happened here?
Jan Söndermann aka bII6, London-based software developer, converted his Olympia Splendid 66 typewriter to many keyboard enthusiasts' favorite alternative layout: Colemak – "a keyboard layout designed for touch typing in English".
As Jan points out in a blog post, Colemak was released in early 2006, so there's no way you can find a typewriter, especially his choice of an Olympia manufactured in the '60s, with any layout similar to Colemak.
however, if you've typed for years using an alternative layout, there's a good chance you can't type on QWERTY anymore. On a programmable keyboard you simply update the keymap. What about a typewriter?
Obviously, you had to break/desolder the type bars/slugs. Fortunately, this specific Olympia had soldered type slugs, but this kind of surgery is still risky since the alignment of the soldered type slugs has to be perfect to yield acceptable results.
The whole operation took me an extended weekend (it’s a bank holiday for the queen’s funeral in the UK today) and I’m pretty happy with the result. Most of the keys are pretty well aligned, the only two that stick out a little bit are ‘n’ and ‘j’ but I don’t mind the extra funkiness.
Read the full blog post with some tips here:
https://soender.blog/Converting-a-Typewriter-to-Colemak/
Published on Mon 26th Sep 2022. Featured in KBD #97 (source).
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