Issue 187 / Week 7 / 2025
This is a hand-picked selection of last week's content from a keyboard enthusiast's perspective. Posts that may teach you something, make you think and contribute to the common knowledge of the DIY builder community.
There are 10+29 entries in this issue:
The early days of Keykrush ORCA
Veronica of Keykrush talks about the development journey of the ORCA – an exciting wireless ergo split keyboard in the fundraising phase.
Typing in the upside down
Will Pucket writes about experimenting with smaller boards and collaging layouts, trying to make his board fulfill its promise of comfort.
Editorial
Behind the scenes #187
Keyboard projects, reviews, quick news, in the mailbox, meetups, vendors, discounts.
Projects
PH60
PHDesign's PH60 is an open-source 60% keyboard project – now with a HHKB variant.
Arctic keyboard
Arctic is a 60% wireless split keyboard shared by Yamil Essus.
Porg40
RaphCoder13 shared a handwired 40% split: Porg40 with trackpad and LED matrix.
Grrr keyboard
A noname 3D-printed ergo keyboard with keywell and semi-parametric design – by Gregory Zhizhilkin.
Sai44
A wireless split with katana layout: Sai44 by leafflat.
ISO13715 macropad
A cute macropad with ISO Enter: ISO13715 by Daniel Gotteswinter.
Sessile
Sessile is a 28-key monoblock split keyboard – designed by Will Pucket.
Quick news
TIPS
Matte ceramic keycaps from Cerakey. Black and white options (only white is available at the moment).
Coral is a cool case by Kyek for his Urchin keyboard.
QMK RGB control display by neoberg.
Closed-source, WIP, etc.
K:03 PRO v2 by ergohaven. With a large 65x49mm touchpad.
Banana keyboard by RGBKB. Haha, we exchanged some thoughts about this ergo project with Legonut more than a year ago. I'm glad it has evolved into a real product. Deluxe aluminum and budget 3D-printed versions.
A gorgeous paper keyboard project with lots of progress photos. Posted by Appropriate_Hippo.
Custom palmrest with buttons and roller encoder – by sinnofinger.
Splinter – a split Minivan [GB] by Leviathan-Mech.
Gossie's JoyKey is an interesting data input device by Gossie/Till_Popular.
Cheebo by Felix-Kyun. A handwired Hillside46 derivative with more splay. 3D-printed case on onshape.
KHEops70 is a WIP analog (HE) ortho board by m_g_s_g.
Adam Leblanc's (aka LeverMind) futuristic Schist01 project is an eyebrow-raiser for sure. An experimented with a wrist-mounted ergo keyboard with a trackpad, running on ZMK.
DarfBoard V2.1 a 6x6 Dactyl by Darfer with a large trackball.
Hmmm. A Reviung with ISO Enter? Committed by icelongclaw.
The layout of this WIP Wolfjaw build reminds me of my 1985 Reuters terminal keyboard: ortho and 0.5u offset stagger combined.
History
The long read: A great essay by Marcin Wichary about Gorton the typeface – not just on keycaps and keyboards: The hardest working font in Manhattan.
Vintage videotex keyboard editor with the distinctive Siemens caps I posted too…
Triumph-Adler SE 1040 & 1041 Ergo Study keyboard by Chyrosran. Yummy!
Keyboard art
Sibelius layout by Laogeodritt. Custom keymap and keycaps for music notation entry. Caps manufactured by Yuzu.
Colorful silk screen – by Azeuth.
Pastel/wood theme by first-castle.
Combining leather crafting and ergo keyboard design. Concept drawing by Notxtwhiledrive.
Another iteration of moobel's monopleg10 – now with cats.
Weekly Diderot effect
NovelKeys Classic-GLO. Injection molded TKL case in three colors – glowing in the dark.
Not sure about comfort, but these wooden wrist rests look cool.
splitkb.com, MoErgo Glove80, ZSA Technology Labs, Upgrade Keyboards, Aiksplace, @keebio, Cyboard, Jason Hazel, Jacob Mikesell, Ergohaven, KEEBD, @kaleid1990, littlemer-the-second, Timo, ghsear.ch, u/motfalcon, FFKeebs, Bob Cotton, TALPKEYBOARD, @therick0996, Christian Mladenov, Brendan P., Schnoor Typography, Daniel Nikolov, u/eighty58five, Caleb Rand, James McCleese, Ben M, zzeneg, Yuan Liu, Anatolii Smolianinov, Spencer Dabell, Penk Chen, Clacky, Matthias Goffette, Stefan S., Alex Miller, Trey Causey, Hating TheFruit, Cloyce, Dylan Ingham, Gordon Diggs, Mario S., Shnobble, Davidjohn Gerena, Duncan B., HubertTheMad, Jesse L., Andres Sakk, Cem A., s_p_l_o_d_e, nutylabs
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