So, here’s one I haven’t really posted about much. It was the second of three handwired “retro” TKLs I did on aluminum plates from Xometry. Compared to the first one, which I use quite a lot, this one mostly lives on the shelf, but I thought I’d take it out and run it for a bit. This is my one and only “bouncy” board, which is very much intentional. It only has proper sandwich pieces on the left and right. The middle four screws are instead supported by fairly firm springs held in place by standoffs that don’t connect the top and bottom plates. Most of my DIY boards are fairly “soft” but none are flexy like this guy. This may also be the only board where “spring ping” is inherent to the chassis, not the switches, LOL. Bottoming out on the F-row sounds a bit like a newlywed couple’s second-hand mattress. 
- TTC Gold Brown Pro from a Novelkeys mystery bag. Still a bit too light for my taste, but nice for browns.
- CSA in Blue Samurai colorway.
- RP2040 running KMK. Perhaps appropriately, the matrix wiring itself is the only thing that supports the MCU, like a fly suspended in a spiderweb.
- 5052 aluminum plates with a bit of fine-grit sanding and polishing
- Hand-filed the weird split Lshift from its two siblings to be proper ISO style, but… meh. Not leaving LShift at ANSI 2.25u is my one regret about the physical layout of these boards. I’m finally trying this again on my current build, but that is specifically to ease keycap kitting on a no-stabs. Here it’s just something that I like less than I could have.
- This board is actually pretty quiet, except for the aforementioned ping and some godawful stab-rattle on the spacebar. I’m a bit of a jackhammer when typing, but the nature of the board and switches makes me use a slightly lighter touch.
It’s nice in its way, but I use this board less than the similar ones with either Box Navy or 67g “Fauxly Pandas” from AE. Along with my early Orthos and the southpaw, it’s a case of “I kinda want this, and though I’m not sure how badly, I do enjoy making stuff.” It would be a fairly minor thing to rework the chassis here to be more traditional, but not much point, so for now it remains an experiment.
