babyv case

THIS IS A WORK IN PROGRESS

I really loved the alice-inspired ortholinear layout by eyeohdesigns, but I also really loved the (now discontinued) rounded and thick bezeled 3d printed case of the prime-e by p3d. This is my attempt to marry the 2 designs with some inspiration from the multipart flurples c13x qaz alice style keyboard.

current issues after first test print

• no angle makes it difficult to type
• no holder for micro
• overall too tall
• tolerances need to be taken into consideration for the pegs in the split case (the connection is very tight and required sanding to make it fit)
• doesn't need to be 2 pieces. top case section can be integrated with the plate portion.

todo

• fix issues with stabiliser in plate
• add hole in case for promicro (scad)
• add holes in inner-case and bottom for screws (scad)
• finalise dimensions (MS 3D Builder)
• round top in blender
• split and add keys in tinkercad
• setup print jobs (gcode)
• post process prints
• wire up the matrix (rgb underglow?)
• solder the micro controller (take note of pins used)
• firmware

a short summary of the very long winded design process

Due to my stubbornness 🐂 and unwilingness to learn how to use a real CAD package (like freeCAD or fusion360), my design workflow goes like this:

flowchart
    A[edited svgs from a <br> laser cut case generator] --> B[openscad script  <br> to make case files];
    B --> C[mesh editing in blender <br> for bevels and round curvy bits];
    C --> D[tinkercad <br> to splice the files for actual printing];
    D --> E[realise something isn't quite right <br> and needs to be changed in the original svg];
    E-->A;

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a slighly longer summary

1. used the svgs that were in the casefiles folder of the eyeohdesigns babyv repo as starting point and edited them so that I had separate files for holes, outline, switch holes, and a top cutout. A little bit of editing was also done to the svgs to move the holes around.
2. openscad script to generate the stls for a 4 part case (bottom, case-inner, plate, case-top)
3. stabilisers:
   • original plate svg did not fit my stabs so I used the keyboardlayout.json from the vial qmk repo and generated a new svg of the plate in builder.swillkb
   • needed to flip the stabiliser cutout by adding _rs:180 to the key in the kle.json
   • after some more test prints it was found that the cherry stab cutout fit best but needed some more room for the stabiliser wire, this was achieved by subtracting 2 rectangular prisms to make more room.
4. bevels and fine touches were added to the case top in blender
5. sliced up the model and added slots and keys to make for a stronger connection
6. imported the model into prusaslicer and split it into the separate objects and printed.

some images of the design process

design in openscad tweaking the mesh in blender (adding bevel on the top case and chamfering the usb hole) getting model ready to print in tinkercad test prints to make sure the dimensions are right for the switches and stabilisers printing the case

the build

printing

trying to keep the print from coming loose that print was a fail (in more ways than 1)

handwiring and firmware

this pro micro diagram proves helpful for every handwire

wiring

firmware

I pretty much just copied the firmware from my previous builds and modified the keymap.c using the firmware available for the babyv on the vial qmk fork.

final product

useful links

• gateron switch datasheet
• cherry mx datasheet