The basis for this mod is the venerated Apple “New aluminum” keyboard. I’ve heard both sides, some people just hate this new keyboard. But for the most part, most of the people I’ve talked to say something along the lines of the cliché “I can’t believe I ever lived without it.”
Such was the case with my wife. She absolutely adores it. The shallow key press, the pleasant tactile response (more fluid and soft than clicking or clunky), the accurate and intuitive layout, all make for the ideal typing experience as far as she’s concerned. And this is very important to someone who spends as much time at the computer as she does.
But here’s the rub: although the keyboard is truly a triumph of form and function, a masterpiece of industrial design in keeping with the highest standards set by the likes of the Mac Pro, the look of the thing positively swears at the rest of our “1900 House.” In order for any object to be really at home in our house, it’s got to look the part. This might be extremely difficult in light of the fact that other than the computer et al, our house is furnished largely with antiques or things that look like they ought to be antiques.
So, with that in mind, I set out to turn this already brilliant piece of equipment into something we could really be proud of, something that could be said to “belong” on her desk, something out of Verne or Austin. Having seen any number of Steampunk keyboard mods, I was compelled to try to copy one of them. However, alas, the New Aluminum keyboard did not lend itself to the brass-and-leather, glass-key variety of keyboard mod, it not having the “stumps” to glue the typewriter keys to, or enough of a profile to affix any special adornments to. No, this, I could see, was a mod that was going to call for a much slighter touch. A bit more finesse and a more minimalist approach. And this, after all, would be more in keeping with the keyboard’s roots.
Mustering all of my modding experience and intellect (ouch), I began to sketch my ideas. I trifled with faux tops made of brass or bronze. At one point I had the metal ordered for a completely different concept, but the piece arrived and it wasn’t at all what I had requested. Itching to get to work, I scrapped that whole line of thinking and finally settled on the (I think) correct design.
The keyboard face is a faux mahogany made actually from poplar wood using a dark stain and satin polyurethane. The keys are a combination of keys borrowed from a Remington Model 7 typewriter and some home-made keys made from black shirt buttons, laser printed paper, diamond glaze, and sections of a servicing straw for height. The spacebar is a folding bone, which just makes me giggle (no it’s not made of real bone, though they used to be).
Once I had all the supplies (or thought I had) it was first things first. I needed a way to make a template of the new aluminum keyboard for reference. I toyed with a few ideas, but finally settled on what was probably the most simple (how often that turns out to be the best).
In the end I just photocopied the entire keyboard to produce a template that maintained the scale within a reasonable tolerance. Now, obviously, the keyboard itself won’t fit within an 8.5” X 11” sheet of paper, so the keyboard had to be copied twice (once for each end) and the two halves spliced together.
Template safely in hand, I began taking measurements from the donor keyboard.
Having done with that, I cut the birch to length on grandpa’s table saw, checking it against the keyboard to verify accuracy before taking my bits home.
Safely back at the lab, I began fashioning spacers to elevate the faux keyboard face above the original keys. I worked out a kind of superstructure that would hold the face close to the keyboard firmly. Using a carpet knife, I carefully cut lengths of the 1/4”x1/4” wooden rod. One for the top, one for the bottom, and one for each end.
With the remnants, I made two additional runs for the space between the number pad and the arrows. I later scrapped that and made a third run lengthwise down the entire keyboard but in the middle between the “D” & “E,” “F” & “R” and etc. I glued the assembly together using your run of the mill wood glue, and clamped them together with “C” clamps overnight.
Next, I taped one of my templates to the piece of poplar, and began drilling the pilot holes for the typewriter key holes. This bit went rather smoothly, and I was feeling somewhat proud of myself. I had the pilot holes done in about an hour and began drilling the 3/8” holes for the keys to go through. Unfortunately, the spade I was using to drill them made a perfect mess upon exiting the other side of the wood. For one reason or another (I think it’s a quality issue) the wood is in fact in layers pressed together. The blade was shredding the last layer more than actually cutting or drilling through it. So I wound up with several botched holes. But no matter, it’ll just look a bit more authentic and distressed. But I needed a better plan.
I tried several different methods trying to make a clean hole through the board, setting the board on top of a piece of scrap wood, drilling really slowly, drilling progressively larger holes…, all with varying degrees of success. I finally happened upon a method that actually worked. See, you have to drill the hole half way through the wood (you can count layers while drilling) and then flip the board over and drill the rest from the other side. Perfect.
Getting all of the big holes took several hours, and I was sore by the time I was done. I don’t own or have ready access to a drill press, so this was all done with a cordless drill. Fatigue sets in quickly when you’re supporting that big battery, so I found that doing ten or so at a shot was best. Otherwise you start to get sloppy and the work suffers.
 |
 |
Every so often during this process I would lay the partially drilled board over the keyboard to check for accuracy and consistency. I tried the keys in the holes to make sure the clearance was acceptable and the depth was sufficient. The Remington Model 7 keys, unlike glass top keys, have a protrusion out the bottom ant it’s all one piece. This kind of stem thing makes them perfect for my purposes. I never ran into any problems, having used the template, but better safe than sorry.
Everything safely drilled and glued together, I was ready for the finishing touches. So it was off to my mother in law’s to stain and poly the wood. In order to get a really nice result she, being the expert, had me sand the assembly with a fairly fine paper to remove all the burrs and splinters, and soften or eliminate any irregularity in the surface of the wood. It took two coats of the stain in fairly quick succession, allowing about 20 minutes for each coat to dry. Then it had to cure overnight before the poly could be applied. Again, two coats of poly in a similar fashion were applied. On thing to note, it’s somewhat difficult to tell if you have good coverage with the polyurethane as it sort of soaks into the wood. It helps to hold the piece up to the light and turn it so that you can see the bulbs reflection. If there’s no reflection, it might not be sufficiently coated.
During this time, I also altered the look of the New Aluminum keyboard itself. I first sanded the back and began painting with the metallic gold Rustoleum. After several coats of that, I switched to flat black.
Now it was time to put the whole thing together. I fixed my new wooden face to the new aluminum keyboard with high temp hot glue. This stuff is a modder’s best friend. No need to wait for glue to dry, it bond well with many different surfaces, and can be removed without damaging most surfaces, but is strong enough for most work.
With that done, I began attaching the Model 7 typewriter keys directly to the original keys using the same glue.
Another great thing with the hot glue, you do have a few seconds to adjust. If the key isn’t totally strait, you can fix it before it sets. Only a small amount of the glue is needed to hold the keys firmly in place. This whole process took about 3 hours…, then I ran out of keys.
Two sets of typewriter keys are not quite enough to do a modern keyboard, so I had to fashion some custom keys. Not to mention a spacebar (the one from the typewriter is altogether unfit for the purpose of this mod).
First, I made the spacebar out of what happened to be lying around – a folding bone! I set it on the keyboard to check the aesthetics, and I could resist. It just looked so cool to me. So, I cut to lengths from my servicing straw (dowel would probably do just as well) and glued them to the bone at the appropriate location.
Then affixed it through the two holes to the original spacebar underneath. I was pretty pleased with the result, so I moved on to the other custom keys.
These I made from some good sized black buttons, which had the basic look I wanted. At this point the photocopies of the keyboard from earlier came in handy again. I simply cut out the characters I needed and glued them to the buttons. Then, over the paper I applied diamond glaze, which is a dimensional embellishment that dries to a thick, nearly clear coating.
Thos had to dry for a few hours, so I got to work making some stems. For this I used some more bits of the servicing straw which, by the way, is nothing more than a flexible plastic pipe. I cut the bits to length using my trusty carpet knife.
Once the diamond glaze was sufficiently dry (it won’t be cured for 24 odd hours) I affixed the stems to the “keys” with hot glue. Then, I attached the keys to the keyboard, using more hot glue.
Once I’d got all the keys in place, I saw that something was missing. I needed a little embellishment for the important keys (apple, command, option). So, with my gold leaf pen, I added some “flare” to them and now they look rather like glass top keys.
And that’s about it! Although, when tested it out, the S and A were a bit mushy and I had to remove and re-attach them. In the end, we do indeed have a keyboard that is right at home on my wife’s old desk.
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
