How to clean your mechanical or membrane keyboard step by step

The life of peripherals

A good scale to get your peripherals to live longer is to follow three basic rules when buying and living with them.

First of all, you should look for those products that offer you a good quality in terms of performance and construction materials. If you go cheap, build quality is often worse, making these peripherals more susceptible to breakage.

On the other hand, it will sound obvious to you, but having a good maintenance on your peripherals is really important. Whether we want to or not, we are going to wear them down, so just like with a car, we have to clean them regularly.

Finally, you have to try not to mistreat them, that is, prevent them from falling, use them with stained hands and so on. In this way, you will get them to have a long life and avoid having to find a replacement every few years.

These three rules apply to everything, but in the case of keyboards, we have to take into account several things. First of all, to know if it is membrane or mechanical, since one requires more care than the other. Also know if they have an external casing or the keys are "on the air" , since the cleaning method is different.

First of all, we have to remind you that all cleaning you do of the keyboard must be with the device disconnected. If you leave it connected, it is possible that it will be permanently damaged when it suffers a short circuit or something similar. We also recommend taking a photo or having a reference of another standard keyboard handy for when you have to reposition the pieces.

Large debris and tough stains

Before doing any cleaning, you may have physical debris between the keys on your keyboard. Maybe there are breadcrumbs, the occasional hair and a piece of plastic that fell out and you never picked it up. Well the first thing you should do before cleaning is to remove these oversized debris.

Source: wikiHow

Just put the peripheral in a trash can or trash and shake it vigorously , but without being gross. Enough for these garbage cans to pop out from between the keys. If you have a casing or the like, it is best to push this dirt into a corner and then remove the key from the corner to "unclog" the system.

On the other hand, you may have some kind of millennial stain from some past battle. If this is the case, you should give special treatment to the affected area or keys . Do the standard procedures that we will tell you in the next points and, if you still resist, we will go to greater solutions.

In that case, isopropyl alcohol can help you . Apply a little on the tool you are using and rub on the affected area. Once cleaned, make sure the alcohol evaporates before reassembling the keyboard.

How to clean a keyboard without a case

Keyboard without housing

What is a keyboard without a case, you wonder? Well, they are those keyboards whose keys are directly mounted on the switch and in turn the switch on the base. Most mechanical keyboards are caseless keyboards , where the device base is typically brushed anodized aluminum.

These keyboards are easier to clean, since the PCB is partially or totally isolated and we only have to take care of cleaning keys and base.

The first step in cleaning these peripherals is to remove the keys. You have to be careful, because the largest and elongated keys usually have more than one spring or even a metal bar that supports them.

Disassemble keys with ring

- If you have a mechanical one, chances are good that they will bring you a ring-shaped tool to remove them. Otherwise, you can do it with some other utensil to pry or even with your hands, but it is not highly recommended.

Then we will have to clean the keyboard base.
- We can do it with wet wipes, a toothbrush with water and some soap or a damp cloth, among other things. In most cases, this cleaning is quite simple. You only have to worry that what you use is humid and not wet, since water can filter between the cracks and holes.

Hollow through which water can filter

On the part of the keys, you can follow the same process, but going one by one, although there is another faster and more global method.
- - For this second method, fill a bowl / container with room temperature water and some soap. Insert the pieces and proceed to clean them all together as if it were a washing machine. It is much faster, but you have to be very careful with what product we use, since some can be harmful to plastic and end up making screenprints illegible.

Finally, we wait for the keys to dry and we put them back. We do not recommend using a hairdryer or similar devices to dry the keys, as heat can distort them.

How to Clean a Enclosed Keyboard

The keyboards with casings are usually membrane, but there are also some mechanics of this style. The only point that changes is that before removing the keys and cleaning the base, we have to remove it.

These peripherals will have a series of screws on the back that, when removed, will release the keyboard case. Then, with the casing out, we follow the same procedure that we have previously discussed.

We extract the keys from the switches with the help of a key ring, other lever tools or our hands. Be careful with the longer keys since they usually have more than one piece.

WE RECOMMEND YOU How to clean your computer, keyboard and mouse due to coronavirus

Mechanical keyboard with disassembled keys

We clean the keys one by one or together.
- Emphasize that we must be extremely careful with what products we use together with warm water. Things like bleach, acidic products and so on are dangerous.

We clean the base with a brush, wet towel or other utensil.
- In this case, since the base has been removed from the keyboard body, we can use water directly on the piece. Under a tap we can brush it with soap and water, but always gently to avoid damaging it.

We have to notice that the PCB and the keyboard circuit have been exposed.
- If water or anything else gets inside, the keyboard can be instantly useless. So make sure both the base and keys are dry and never dry them with a hot dryer as it can warp the keys.

Mechanical keyboard after cleaning

Maintenance at a lower level

If you want to do a little maintenance, but without having to disassemble the entire keyboard, the best you can use are:

Elongated brushes for pipes, flutes and others. With them you can clean under the keys almost without problem. Canisters of compressed air, with which you will expel, based on air pressure, the dirt under the keys. They are relatively cheap, but you can't use them too many times. Small handheld vacuums, which will help us absorb or expel less resistant dirt under the keys. It works almost the same as compressed air canisters. Wet towels and absorbent paper to clean certain affected areas in moments of occasional accidents. Disconnect the keyboard and shake it over the trash. It is not highly recommended, as the stubborn dirt will remain, but this way you can remove some superficial residues.

Can of compressed air

With these tips, you can clean your keyboard in a more superficial way, thus keeping it clean and cared for longer. Despite this, we also recommend not eating near your peripherals, not confining them in confined spaces or exposing them to the sun or continued humidity and other degrading situations.

Final words

If you want your adventure companions to be durable and, in addition, not having to buy a new one every two years, follow these recommendations. The peripherals are very long-lived and the keyboards, in particular, are especially resistant.

There are keyboards from the 70s and 80s that are still functional today. All this thanks to the good care and maintenance to which they have been subjected. Your device does not need to last for decades, since it is likely that you squeeze them much more working and / or playing, but you should take care of them so that they last as long as possible.

We hope the tutorial has been helpful to you. If you have any questions, feel free to tell us in the comment box below. We will reply to you as soon as we can.

Font Mechanical KeyboardWikiHowUniversaria