The perfect mouse pad

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Lions are strange animals who haven't migrated to using a phone for everything, but still adhere to their huge 1990's style mouse & keyboard. The perfect mouse pad has a top material which provides the optimum amount of damping to the mouse movement, a bottom material which doesn't slide along the desk, & yet withstands frequent repositioning.

The problem is the huge 1990's style, fabric covered mouse pads are no more. The modern ones are all either 1/8" thick, really tiny, covered in smooth plastic & don't last very long.

The lion kingdom's 1st mouse pad was a 1/4" thick, 8x8.5" , & lasted 19 years before it was down to just fabric & a different color from biological growth & the neighbor's cigarette smoke. The modern ones that replaced it all wore out within a year.

A recent attempt at reviving the magic was stacking 2 modern 1/8" thick mouse pads on top of each other with E6000. The old, worn out one was on the bottom. This too was only a temporary solution.

Mouse pads are made from neoprene & an unknown fabric. The neoprene compresses & falls apart. The fabric delaminates. Lions want to go a step beyond the 1990's, manely a 1/2" thick mouse pad. The neoprene can be made by stacking thinner sheets, but getting a perfectly flat adhesion of fabric to it is the problem.

A few ideas emerged, manely to solve the problem of modern mouse pads not sticking to the desk. The key to this is making them heavier & possibly attaching them to the keyboard. A modern keyboard is heavy enough to stick. A 1 piece keyboard mouse pad has the mane problem of taking up a lot of space. Maybe the mouse pad could farsten with magnets.

Another problem lions have encountered is the mouse cable. Wireless mice always went dead, but wired mice have a difficult cable.

Project Logs

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Giant mouse pad
lion mclionhead • 11/11/2022 at 04:34 • 0 comments

Giant mouse pads seem to be the rage nowadays. They even made it to Walmart for $10 so the lion kingdom caved. The mane problem is there's no place to put it while eating, so lions eat on it. Mouse pads have historically not reacted well to water. Hopefully, giant mouse pads don't go the way of $8 VR goggles.
The best cable position so far.
EVA experiences
lion mclionhead • 09/13/2022 at 21:42 • 0 comments

EVA has provided good adhesion to laminate desk material when weighed down. A big sheet can be weighed down by the keyboard. The problem is its static cling attracts dirt, but the dirt seems to be shaken off more easily than neoprene. It needs a fabric mouse pad on top to provide the right friction.

The ultimate mouse pad is trending toward a 12x18" sheet of 1/4" EVA, completely covered in mouse fabric, going under the keyboard. That's the largest sheet sold locally. The trick is adhering the fabric to it.

The trick seems to be 1st ironing on adhesive to the EVA, then ironing on the fabric, then cutting the fabric.

A more manly way of doing it is with spray adhesive, a table saw, & a dog.

There are commercially produced mouse pads which cover the entire desk, but they range from 1mm thick to 3mm thick. They seem to be made of neoprene, with all the problems. They can be super expensive depending on thickness.

https://www.amazon.com/cimetech-Comfortable-Superfine-Waterproof-645x315x1mm/dp/B07ZNV9B8Z

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08V8BNPR6/ref=sspa_dk_detail_2?pd_rd_i=B08V8BNPR6

1 advantage of 12"x18" is it's easy to remove for eating & cleaning. Anything hot is going to warp the EVA. That makes lions doubtful about ironing adhesive on to EVA. Elbows compress the EVA, making 1/4" a better thickness.

Caveat lion: EVA shrinks when it gets hot. It's not clear how anyone is ironing adhesive onto it without warping it.

After several weeks, the lion kingdom's pad was a warped mess from cookware getting on it. It might require a commercial mouse pad on temporary EVA. Note, hacking the mouse cable is the single greatest improvement in mouse mobility. It should come out of the side at a right angle. Unlike a wireless mouse, it doesn't die every few days.
If Steve Jobless was still alive, all mice would look like this.
Reusable adhesive pads
lion mclionhead • 08/29/2022 at 20:51 • 0 comments

Mouse pads slide over modern laminated desks like ice. Using a mouse directly on a laminated desk is impossible. It's so slippery, the mouse slides erratically & it's impossible to aim. The mouse plastic & the laminate plastic wear down.

There was a reusable adhesive mouse pad long ago, no longer manufactured. The adhesive wore out eventually. It wouldn't survive the daily repositioning that lions require. It was only 7x8.5" There was no evidence it had the right fabric upper.

1 idea was to attach the mouse pad to the relatively stable keyboard but it's not big enough, so a backing sheet is necessary. What seems to resist movement are narrow ridges of silicone rubber on the underside & enough weight to press it down. The narrow ridges don't trap junk the way a flat surface does.

Cardboard has been tried twice. It warps & causes the mouse pad to warp. A large EVA sheet is an intriguing material. It conforms to the desk flatness. It sticks to a normal mouse pad & seems to grab the laminate with the weight of the keyboard. It's large enough to go under the keyboard. It might suffice as a mouse pad by itself.

If the mouse pad is under the keyboard, the cable becomes a problem. The lion kingdom is debating a side firing cable.