1Up Keyboards Custom DIY USB Cable Kit Discussions | Drop

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1Up Keyboards Custom DIY USB Cable Kit

Jul 7, 2016

Tempting, but I do solder professionally, and not even a single one of the paracord color options even remotely matches with my Danger Zone keyboard build. Probably have to pass. I also have the most flexibly awesome cable on hand... It's 9 conductors, with 3 heavier gauge wires internally shielded from 6 outer smaller gauge wires (also shielded... It's like a braided shield running inside another braided shield). I use it for manufacturing surgical tools, and I have a TON of scrap! It's about $10 a foot at quantities of 2000 feet, and we use 10 feet at a time, so if the cable at the end of the spool isn't exactly 10 feet... like say it's 9.75... I get to take it home! We literally can't use it for production! :D
There was also that one time a less experienced employee... made a mistake cutting 20 pieces... I may have also dug those out of the recycling bin, once the dust had settled...
This drop does give me the idea to look into solderable USB ends (I can solder just fine, y'all! I don't need no stinkin' snap together USB legos!) LOL :P Honestly, I really would just go with a solderable end. And yellow heatshrink. I'll look for dark blue and grey paracord, and let the heatshrink carry the yellow highlight theme of the keyboard (WASD, arrows, Enter).
Depending on what the connector costs, I'd possibly have considered a paracord/cable delete option, but I don't know if the price would be worth the fuss. Going with solderable connectors. I can get ones with real plastic housings. They're cheap, but shipping will bump it close to what the price here is already at, so I suppose it breaks even for me.

Jul 7, 2016

bendrexl

Jul 7, 2016

richfilesDang - I'd love some of that cable, I need a 3.0 micro-b for ergodox infinity. Apparently, the only braided 3.0 cables on amazon/ebay are from a single factory, as the all suck :P

Jul 7, 2016

richfiles

275

Jul 8, 2016

bendrexlOn hand, I have a section that's approximately 6 feet (2 meters) and another that's 9 feet (about 3 meters). I can easily curl the cable to about a 3 inch (8cm) diameter circle, and not feel like I'm forcing it. If you hold the wire, it'll loop down to about a one inch (2.4 cm) circle (on the inside diameter). Nice stuff! So, as I said, it has two sets of wires, three conductors at (I THINK... not 100% sure) around 26 ga, and 6 conductors at I think 30 ga. There are two electrically isolated braided jackets, with teflon insulation tape wrapped inside the braid. The outer braid wraps the 6 smaller wires (and has 6 teflon filler strands to keep the wires separated evenly). It's durable too, the wire strands are SUPER fine, which is how it's so flexible. When you strip the wire, the strands tend to "puff out" a bit, cause they are simply too thin to keep any rigidity. That's a good thing! :P
The jacket insulation is very stretchy... The cables I assemble have the jacket pulled back, the cable assembled, then the jacket fed through a compressing strain relief, and butted to the connector's internal housing. It results in a cable that's water, air and even steam resistant. They have to be, cause as a part for a surgical tool, it'll be repeatedly autoclaved, which is basically cooking it in a pressure cooker. >100°C at >atmospheric pressure. The ones we use at the lab where I work are 122-124°C @ 17 PSIg.
The original application for these cables would have been to operate a brushless electric motor in a surgical tool. The three larger gauge wires were to carry power to the motor's windings, and the 6 smaller wires carry power to and signals from the magnetic hall effect sensors that provide the commutation signals from the motor to the drive circuit.
I have more out at my storage unit, but I'd have to dig it up. I presume you're the same bendrexl at GeekHack? I'll send you a PM.
And yeah, this cable IS pretty sweet! :D

Jul 8, 2016

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