I switched from Sanwa buttons to keyboard switches in my controllers for increased durability, improved switch feel, cheaper price, and more customizability.

I wanted to find a force curve for Sanwa switches to visually show the bumpiness in them that I disliked, but unfortunately I couldn’t find one online. Because of this, I bought a force meter on amazon, secured it to my 3D printer’s arm which can be precisely moved up and down, and manually entered the reading on the force meter into a spreadsheet for each increment my 3D printer can move.

This methodology is limited in precision since the printer can only move in 0.1mm steps, and the force meter can only measure to the nearest gram. Also, I can’t be super sure of the accuracy of either the meter or the 3D printer’s movement.

Because of this, I decided to first test a Gateron Red switch, which has already been measured by a well known member of the keyboard community, HaaTa, who has a much more sophisticated force curve measurement rig.

If the shape of the force curve I measure looks close to HaaTa’s I’ll know my setup can give some insight into how a switch feels.