Keyboard Builders' Digest / Tips & Tricks
SLK keycap profile
SLK Dessau by Kema/FKcaps is the first keyset with the uniform spherical SLK keycap profile.
Published May 22, 2023
Life is busy at the FKcaps HQ. While working on URSA and rolling out a cool keycap customizer app (post coming soon), the SLK Dessau GB is still running.
Given the many projects, no wonder I totally forgot about reporting on SLK, which is a unique uniform profile with spherical tops – so let's correct this deficiency.
SLK is a uniform profile keycap delivering a new ultra-low-profile option for MX-style switches with no compromises. The keycap's spherical top surface provides a "cuppy" feel, reminiscent of arcade machine pushbuttons. It features a thick PBT construction, with an extended skirt below the typical bottom of an MX keycap to provide a deeper sound – fkcaps.com.
While calling this set "ultra-low-profile" may be misleading (don't mistake it for some fancy Kailh X switch caps), it's indeed very short in MX terms. In fact, with a height of just 7.5 mm, the SLK is 18% shorter than a DSA cap.
One more thing which makes it stand out of the crowd is its lowered side skirt that extends down past the switch stem line to better hide the switches underneath.
Specs
- uniform, spherical
- Material: PBT
- Thickness: 1.5 mm
- Height: 7.5 mm
- Legends: dye-sublimation
Synth Labs originally designed the SLK keycaps for a rythm game controller, and that idea quickly expanded into a full-on keycap set.
The very first keyset with the SLK profile is SLK Dessau. San Francisco-based designer Kema, who has been working on keycap projects for fun since 2018 (e.g GMK Future Funk, GMK Peach Blossom and KAM Little Pilot), was inspired by retro German industrial design.
The keyset features a modern classic monospace typeface and comes in light and dark dye-sublimated colorways with shift and shifted legends accented in red or yellow to highlight their function.
Availability
If you are interested, you can preorder SLK Dessau until May 31st.
- SLK Dessau at FKcaps.
- SLK keycap profile at FKcaps.
- SLK Dessau official website.
Published on Mon 22nd May 2023. Featured in KBD #123.
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