What is it?

This is the Tactile Switch version of my Hexadecimal Keypad designs.

Providing a budget version Hex Keypad for your Retro Computing projects, which provides Tactile Feedback keys and is considerably more comfortable to use than the various cheap Membrane style Keypads you typically find for sale these days.

The pin headers used for connecting the Keypad are breadboard friendly (see my Youtube videos), or the headers can easily connect with female header sockets you might use on your own Retro computer project PCBs.

In addition, this Keypad has been designed using the standard 0.75 inch (19.05mm) centres key spacing, for natural comfort in Keypad data entry.

The Keyswitches were carefully chosen to provide the best quality and tactile feel for a usable budget Hexadecimal Keypad. The Keyswitches are dustproof & waterproof and have an electrical life rating of >50,000 keypresses.

How to Use the Keypad

The Keypad provides a standard 4x4 matrix for the sixteen 0-9 and A-F Hexadecimal keys, together with two common wired function switches.

Normally you would connect the 4x4 matrix to an 8 bit I/O port to enable polling the 16 hexadecimal keys. The 2 function keys would normally have their common connection to GND, therefore providing 2 switched inputs to GND. Typically used to implement a system Reset (RST) switch, and a Function (FN) select switch input.

Pinouts for both the 8 way and 3 way pin headers are shown in the attached schematic diagram.

I provide the Keypad in Kitset form, so you can easily assemble it with your own soldering iron. All that is required is to solder in place the supplied 18 clip-in Tactile Keyswitches, and the supplied pin headers. Four Nylon PCB Stand-offs and eight Nylon Screws are also supplied, for mounting your Keypad.

Below you'll find a Youtube video where you can see me assembling one of my Tactile Switch Hex Keypads. A second video (Part 2) is also available on my Youtube channel, where I go on to demonstrate testing and using the 4x4 Matrix Keypad with Arduino.

What You Get

Each Tactile Switch Hex Keypad Kitset contains:

• 1x Silkscreened Double-Sided "Tactile Switch" Hexadecimal Keypad PCB
• 18x Waterproof 50,000 cycle Tactile Keyswitches
• 1x 20-Pin Header strip (for making the 8 + 3 Pin Headers)
• 4x M3 12mm Nylon PCB Stand-offs
• 8x M3 6mm Nylon Screws (for affixing the Stand-offs)