Klaw 2

KLAW - 34-key split keyboard

KLAW is a compact 34-key split keyboard with LEDs, OLED, buzzer and encoder. It is designed as one reversible PCB that serves both halves - components on the back face make the right half, components on the front face make the left half. One board design: the same gerber files can be used for both halves, with separate BOM and CPL files per half. Every component can be machine-assembled, but you may want to hand-assemble the MCU and OLED modules. The latest hardware revision is rev 2.

Below are renders of the right half:

Features

• 34 keys (17 per half), column-staggered, MX-style switches
• Hot-swap sockets (Kailh CPG151101S11-compatible) - no switch soldering
• Per-key RGB - SK6812MINI-EA LEDs, reverse-mounted to glow through the board (machine-assemblable)
• Wired or wireless - TRRS between halves, or Bluetooth with a nice!nano-compatible controller (socketed, Pro Micro pinout); battery connector and power switch on board (unpopulated in the wired-first default)
• Rotary encoder (EC11) per half - volume knob or anything you map to it
• 0.96″ SSD1306 OLED per half
• Piezo buzzer, reset button, and optional splitkb tenting puck mounting
• Optional trackball level-converter header (unpopulated by default)
• Configuration by placement - the OLED mapping, trackball routing, and battery-polarity links are 0603 0R resistors, placed per side by the assembly service; nothing to bridge by hand

Repository layout

The case is designed in Plasticity and maintained outside this repository.

Building one

1. Order the PCBs. Both halves use the same board - upload fab/klaw_2-gerbers.zip to JLCPCB (2-layer, 1.6 mm). For machine assembly place two orders with the same gerbers: the right half assembles on the Bottom side (fab/right-half/), the left half on the Top side (fab/left-half/). Each order is double-sided and covers everything solderable - see fab/README.md for the exact flow and placement-review checklist.

2. No soldering required - the assembly orders cover everything solderable: diodes, factory-reversed per-key RGB LEDs (SK6812MINI-EA), hot-swap sockets, TRRS, buzzer, reset switch, encoder, and each side's 0R configuration resistors (double-sided assembly: the buzzer and encoder mount on the keycap face, every other machine-placed part on the component face). Mount-face tables, part numbers, prices, and per-half quantities are in bom/.

3. Add your own MX-style switches (hot-swap, no soldering), a nice!nano-compatible controller (socket it - the MCU mounts on the bottom, components facing the PCB, as marked on the silkscreen), a 4-pin I²C SSD1306 OLED module, and keycaps. For a wireless build, additionally fit the power switch (C431540), JST battery connector (C173752), and a 301230-or-similar LiPo - those three positions are DNP in the wired-first default, but their polarity-selection resistors are already placed correctly per side.

4. Firmware. Flash the KLAW firmware (QMK/Vial) from scrambletools/klaw-firmware.

The KiCad project embeds datasheet links, LCSC part numbers, and last-checked stock/pricing on every schematic symbol, so kicad-cli sch export bom always gives you a current shopping list.

Credits & license

KLAW is a derivative of the KLOR keyboard by GEIGEIGEIST - the layout, reversible-footprint approach, and much of the PCB heritage come from that project. Licensed under GPL-3.0, same as KLOR; see LICENSE.md. The Cherry MX switch 3D model comes from the kiswitch keyswitch-kicad-library (MIT / CC-BY-SA 4.0); the nRF52840 SuperMini controller model comes from shnaps/garden36 (MIT).