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Why did it never occur to me.. You can wash a keyboard in water.

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mouser:
I'm not sure why it never occurred to me, but i have thrown out keyboards after they got too disgustingly dirty, under the assumption that they were too grimey to get clean without getting soap and water in them..

Then it occurred to me that maybe you could wash a keyboard with water as long as you let it completely dry before plugging it in.

Some searching on the internet suggests that it can be done safely.



So I gave the theory a real test, submerging and soaking my keyboard in a bathtub of water and then power washing it with a garden hose.

By the time i was done it looked brand new.  A couple of hours left in front of a strong fan and then a week left to dry, and it works 100%.

Don't know why no one ever told me about this before..

rgdot:
I knew that but reason I never tried it was the attached PS/2, USB cables. Don't ask why I would think those can be damaged while the keyboard itself would not...

Renegade:
Hmmm... I should check to see if I have an extra lying around and then give this one a try. It's pretty grimy right now. I was cleaning it with a Q-tip and hand-sanitizer the other day. Still could use a decent cleaning though. You can only get so much that way.

eleman:
I prefer to open the keyboard up and remove all electronics (the electronic part is usually located on a single circuit board smaller than half a credit card, so it's easy) and then wash the plastics with liberal amounts of liquid soap and a toothbrush (which I don't use for my teeth :)

After the plastics dry, I reassemble the kit. It's pretty easy, easier than installing cpu and fan on some motherboards I suppose.

apankrat:
You should try baking next :)

BTW, I'd blow dry the keyboard though. Where I am at, the water is really hard. Even a simple drop of water dries into a visible circle, so letting the keyboard dry naturally is likely to result in a lot of extra calcium in the insides.

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