Stabilisers are where most builds go wrong

What they do

Keys wider than about two units need support at both ends or they rock. A stabiliser is a wire and two housings that keep the far end travelling with the pressed end.

The two failure modes

Rattle — the wire moving loosely in its housing, heard as a metallic tick beside the keypress. Ticking — the wire striking the PCB at the bottom of travel.

Both are mechanical, both are fixable, and neither is a switch problem.

Fixing them

Clip the small legs off the stem so it sits flush, apply a thick grease to the wire ends where they meet the housing, and use a thin lubricant on the housing interior. Grease on the wire ends does most of the work.

Why it matters more than it sounds

Spacebar, shift, enter and backspace are among the most-pressed keys on the board. A build with excellent switches and rattling stabilisers reads as a bad build, because those are the keys you hear.