Day 18: Slicin' and Dicin'

While awaiting the arrival of more balance rail pins, I decided to go ahead and start cutting the keyboard apart. The first step was to use my trusty Riyobi BT3000 table saw/router to trim the guide rail end of the keyboard down so it's 3/16" thick; this required taking 5/16" off of that end using the router.

As you can see, it took a couple of routes for me to complete the cut, which is 3/4" deep because my largest router bit is 5/8" wide (time for a new bit or two?). The completed cut turned out pretty well.

Once that was done, I could begin the harrowing process of cutting the individual keys from the keyboard blank. Mr. Miller describes how this is a tedious and nerve-wracking undertaking. After a quick band saw tune-up, I found it to be a fairly enjoyable process.

The first step is to cut along the lines between the B and C and E and F keys. The reason for this is that the interface between these keys is a straight line from the front to the back of the keyboard (no sharps between them). The other cuts will take considerably more time and effort and include using a scroll saw. The photo below illustrates the first cut between the low E and F keys.

The remaining cuts went smoothly and I'm actually looking forward to getting this thing completely sliced and diced up.

Until next time...