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How Can I Make NICE Front Panel Push-Button Actuators for PCB SMD MC Switches?

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SuzyC:
I made a really nice device that doesn't look or feel good to operate in a small black Bakelite project box (2-in by 4-in by approx 2-in deep box). I mounted several through-hole tiny push-button switches on a PCB mounted on one (2-in) exterior side of the box and they work fine, but the tiny round actuating buttons that the switches present to the user are not nice to look at, nor nice to touch and press, and the naked PCB sitting  on the front panel looks so nerdy prototypical!

Tiny push-button SMD or through-hole M.C. push switches are cheap and tactile and rugged and easily mounted on a PCB. The problem is to make a long button that extends from the tiny round actuating area of the  switch on a PCB that goes through the side of a small ~3/16 to 3/8-in thick wall of the box to then have a good looking, small but larger, tactile push-button buttons on what is then a front panel.  One that give smooth operation, doesn't easily pull off. The device uses five switches to operate.

Front-Panel screw and nut mount switches as an alternative would be just fine, much more expensive, take a lot of screwing around to mount them, and they would work except that they are much too big and use too much of the precious interior project box space and also too much front-panel space!

Does anyone have any idea how to make a front panel actuator like this?

Richard Crowley:
There are small tactile pushbutton switches with longer shafts. 
Example: https://www.sparkfun.com/products/8605

There are also key caps which push on to the shaft.
https://www.google.com/search?q=tactile+switch+key+cap&source=lnms&tbm=isch

SuzyC:
Thanks Richard Crowley!

The problem with these switches you've linked is that they either have longer, but tiny round shafts or else are nice little buttons that mount directly onto the switches on a PCB with a low profile(this requires a PCB on the exterior panel),  or that they have nice buttons shapes that are not removable and so cannot be removed  to be then attached to the button switch on a PCB by being pushed into holes on the exposed(panel) side of a project box (These would require large holes to be drilled into the side panel to allow the large buttons to protrude.)

The idea is to make my projects that not only work nice, but look nice, to conceal the private parts of the magical works hidden within, while not using up a lotta space within the box.

tautech:
I've always liked the idea of loose "top hat" style buttons setup to be snug against tactile switches and the "brim" prevents them from escaping from the case. They wouldn't be hard to spin up from coloured plastic/nylon rod with a hobby lathe. Your choice to use very short tactile switches hard against the button or long units and the buttons drilled for the push rod.  :-\
This means a fairly precise PCB mounting to make it all work.  ;)

SuzyC:
That 's the ticket tautech! Can you tell me where you found a source for your affordable hobby lathe and plastic/metal stock?


So far the best solution I have come up with is to superglue tiny but thick square hard rubber pieces onto the top of the round PCB switch buttons, then I tried pressing gold-colored metal thumbtacks having a long shaft through ~1mm holes in the panel to stick into the rubber pieces. Problem is, they are difficult to center onto the rubber on the switches and I have found that they are way too easy to pull off and be lost.

I can easily visualize a brass round button that would have a shaft that pushed through the panel and secured by an interior c-clip on the shaft and then to be just the right length to to reach the top of the button switch and then the button bottom itself would bottom-out onto the panel to prevent over-travel so as to not damage the switch.

I have taken apart the front panels of printers and VCR's and notice that the switches have a sheet of custom shaped cantilevered actuators that are cut onto a single sheet of flexible plastic. Don't try to make this at home!

All I need to do is try to fine a source of metal stock and a lathe! Sounds to me though like a lot of work!

Maybe a 3-D printer is what I have to save up for!

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