junior week dec. 11, 2025

i'm sick as of writing this (i think), so i didn't get much done on the thurs.

pcb

unwired everything and replaced the needed keys with their corresponding stabilizers, after that, i had to rewire everything again which wasn't fun.

wasn't hard, just tedious. however, i think i did a way better job with the wiring as there isn't as many vias as the first edition. this won't change anything, but it will make wiring it slightly harder because it's not on the same row it's supposed to be on.

new wiring

the new wiring (if you can see)

improved microcontroller area

zoomed in on microcontroller area. way less vias.

comparison last week

last week's for comparison.
pcb front pcb back
###### the keys with stabilizers were set to bottom to line up correctly with the other keys. i was too lazy to adjust the footprint.

with this all done, the pcb should be ready to be shipped out. just in case, i created a very complex pcb to be cut in cardboard to test stabilizers positioning.

cardboard stabilizer test 1 cardboard stabilizer test 2

hopefully the stabilizers arrive soon so i can test if the footprint that i stole from online works.

keycaps

so i forgot to create a tab key, so i accidentally printed all the keys besides tab to test tolerances.

tab key model

tab key

i guess the orientation i printed it in wasn't ideal, as the tolerances came out really poorly and it wouldn't fit into the keys. since i was also testing the look of the keycaps, i decided to just use heat to open up the cross and placed them to check.

keycaps test fit

turned out pretty well (minus the space bar which got totally destroyed when heating it up) and i was quite satisfied with the look. i edited the tolerances and reprinted just one key a few times before getting the tolerances correct.

since i plan on the final keycaps being made in resin, i decided to resin print the r2 1x1 keycap just to see how it would feel in resin, and to check if the tolerances for the resin printer were similar to the 3d printer.

resin print preform

it's not gonna be done today as it still needs to be washed and everything. however, i'm looking forward to seeing how my first ever resin print comes out.