Pro tip: I lubed my first set of switches with the wrong grease and it made them worse

Harper Gibson · 2026-09-20T16:50:03.825843+00:00

I built my first board about 8 months ago and decided to lube the switches myself to save some cash. I grabbed a tube of thick dielectric grease from the auto parts store down the street because it was $6 and reviews said it was slick. After 2 hours of opening and coating 68 switches, the keys felt sticky and mushy, like pressing through wet sand. I typed on it for a week at my desk in Portland and my fingers actually got tired faster than with the stock switches. I ended up buying a proper $12 tube of Krytox 205g0 and redoing every single one, which took another 3 hours. Turns out the cheap stuff was way too thick for the tiny parts inside. What lube do you all use for linears, and does the thin stuff really make that big a difference?

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Pro tip: I lubed my first set of switches with the wrong grease and it made them worse | Custom Keyboard Builders - Topic Shares