If you’ve seen keyboard videos that sound great and without any metal rattling sounds, that’s probably because the keyboard’s stabilizers have been modified. It’s rare to find keyboards with stabilizers that sound good straight from the factory, which is why there are so many ways keyboard enthusiasts have discovered to make their stabilizers sound better.
Here are the most effective ways to modify and improve the sound of your keyboard’s stabilizers.
Why You Should Modify Your Mechanical Keyboard Stabilizers
The stabilizers are one of the weakest parts of a mechanical keyboard when it comes to sound. Rattly and noisy stabilizers can really bring down the whole experience no matter how expensive or good-looking your board is,even if you’re using a custom mechanical keyboard.
If you want your keyboard to be more satisfying to type on, the stabilizers are the first thing that should come to mind. There are many ways to modify your stabilizers, all addressing different types of problems:
Method #1: Lubing
Lubing has to be one of the most important mods for your stabilizers. It’s incredibly rare to find stabilizers that can be silenced without the use of lube. There are keyboards that have prelubricated stabilizers.
Lubing is a pretty straight-forward and simple process. There are two ways you can go about it.
Lubing Your Stabilizers the Traditional Way
The traditional method to lube your stabilizers requires you to remove them. This may be easier from some keyboards than others. Some stabilizers are soldered or screwed, but many are just clipped in place, especially on cheaper keyboards.
If you’relubing mechanical keyboard switches, you might as well lube your stabilizers as well, since you’ll need to remove the switch to remove the stabilizer.
You can dip your stabilizer wires inKrytox 205g0orSuper Lube 21030and spread it out like in the video above. The housing and stem should also get a light brushing of lube to make the travel smoother.
Injection Lubing Your Stabilizers
If you have a soldered stabilizer, or the switch is soldered down, you can use a syringe to inject lubricant into the stabilizer instead. Make sure to use Krytox 205g0, Super Lube 21030, orDielectric Grease. Don’t use petroleum jelly, which can slowly destroy the plastic on your stabilizers.
You could then use a brush to spread the lubricant, so you don’t get dry spots that’ll potentially make a rattling noise.
Method #2: Tuning
If your stabilizers are lubed, but you hear “ticking” when lightly tapping the long keys without pressing them down all the way, then this might mean your stabilizer wires aren’t balanced. Although, there are other factors that can lead to ticking, you can usually minimize the sound at the very least; especially if the ticking only occurs on one side of the stabilizer.
The process of straightening your stabilizer wires is called tuning, and properly tuned stabilizers have an even travel, reducing the tapping noise that usually happens because of unevenness in the stabilizers.
To tune your stabilizers, firstly clean off any lubricant that’s on the stabilizers.
Lay it down on a very flat and hard surface. The keyboard community likes using the back of an iPhone, but you can also use the screen of any phone. Just be careful not to scratch your screen with the metal wire. In this case, we’re using a tablet screen.
Tap the tips and find where it’s unbalanced, then twist the wire to remove the imbalance. You’ll need to do this step repeatedly, twisting it little by little. Avoid trying to fix it in one big twist as you might make it worse.
Once the wire doesn’t have any imbalance, apply lubricant and put it back. If tuning doesn’t work, and you still get tapping noise, you might need to head to the next methods such as the Holee mod or wrapping your stabilizer wires.
Method #3: Band-Aid Mods
Keyboard enthusiasts have been using adhesive bandages since around 2018, due to the thickness and softness. It dampens all sorts of noises while not over-dampening to the point that a keypress feels mushy.
There are many types of bandage mods, such as wrapping your stabilizer wires, wedging the stabilizer housing, and the famous Holee mod.
Wrapping Your Stabilizer Wire
To wrap your stabilizers, you simply need to take some adhesive bandages and cut it long enough to wrap the wire tip that goes into the stabilizer housing. If you don’t have bandages, you’re able to also use two layers of masking tape.
You can choose to lubricate it afterward if you want, but if your stabilizer housing is already lubricated, you might not need to.
Wedging Your Stabilizer Housing
This is usually for clip-in stabilizers as screw-in stabilizers don’t have much movement to them. The clips on certain stabilizers might not tightly fit onto the backplate.
Simply cut a small piece of bandage, enough to wrap over where the stabilizer snaps onto the backplate. Wiggle the stabilizer left and right to test if it reduced the movement.
Alternatively, you may use a small piece from a cotton ball and place it in between where the stabilizer goes on the plate.
The Holee mod works similar to wrapping your stabilizer wires, but instead of putting the bandage on the wires, you put it in the housing instead. You’ll need to clean your stabilizer of any lube first, however, as the bandage won’t stick if there’s any lube left on the stabilizer housing.
In the video above by Hamaji Neo, you’ll see that putting a bandage in the stabilizer housing is a bit finicky because of how small the stabilizer housing is, but it does result in a cleaner look. This is especially beneficial for transparent stabilizers as you won’t be able to see the bandage that clearly unlike wrapping the wires.
Method #4: Fitting Your Keycaps
This is one of the most overlooked parts of a tapping stabilizer. Lubing, tuning, bandaging, all makes it sound and feel great on the downstroke—but if you still get some tapping on the corners and edges of your stabilizer, it might be because your keycap isn’t fitting snugly onto the stabilizer stem.
To make your keycaps fight more tightly to the stabilizer stem, simply use a single ply of tissue or toilet paper and stuff it into the stem hole on the keycap like in the image above.
Method #5: Clipping Your Stabilizer Housing
Clipping your stabilizer housing can be a bit daunting as it’s a destructive modification. However, it’s one of the most important modifications to a better-feeling stabilizer.
What you’re clipping off are the suspensions on the stabilizer. They’re meant to soften the force of tapping the keys down, but they’re unnecessary as normal usage is very unlikely to break the stabilizer. This suspension system only makes the stabilizer feel soft and unsatisfying.
To clip your stabilizers, it’s best to useflush cuttersto cut them off. Flush cutters cut cleanly and flat, so you won’t have any protrusions left over after cutting.
Stabilize Your Stabilizers to Improve Your Keyboard’s Sound
Stock stabilizers are usually annoying, especially if they’re not lubed from the factory. However, sometimes lubing isn’t enough, and you’ll be lucky to have a keyboard that has perfect stabilizers without needing to modify them. We hope that one of these methods will help your keyboard sound more satisfying and less annoying so you can better enjoy typing.
