A silly project to replace my keyboard keycaps

this is the keyboard I use at the office. It's an old, cheap Logitech K120, with painted on buttons that I have been using everyday for over six and a half years. I like the feel of this keyboard and the buttons are suitably clicky and I am very used to this keyboard.

My issue with it is that several of the more frequently pressed buttons are faded. Under normal circumstances, I would just toss it and get a new one.....but I enjoy a challenge and I have a 3d printer and some relatively decent drafting skill.....so I removed one of the keycaps and measured all of it's intricacies in order to make my own replacement keycaps....but with the lettering embedded into the keycap as part of it, using my new multi material attachment for my 3d printer that allows me to print objects with more than one material at a time (it's pretty awesome)

this is the result of the final model in sketchup with no lettering or symbols on it. the curved facia was especially difficult to replicate, but I think it turned out great

This is a view of the model in wireframe, to show the curvature of the keycap face. I will soon be making the lettering for the key cap as well. I have already done some research on this and measured the location and size of the lettering.

I discovered that the lettering that logitech uses for this particular keycap (I don't know if it's universal to all of them), is a modified version of Helvetica. I have already made the replacement template images for the seven letters I will be replacing (to begin with) on my keyboard and still need to extrapolate them into a usable mesh to boolean into the keycap. It will also be possible to make it either embossed or engraved. when I have done my test printed, I will be doing several versions.

I can also make custom designs like emojis or different fonts for lettering, which I think is super cool.

This is the underside of the keycap. I have found that there are several different types of keycap connector due to the configuration of the keyboard switch type.

this is accurate to about 0.05mm to the original keycap reference I used.

It is my intention that this model and any additional variations I make of it will be available on my makerworld page when ready.