Fulcrum VS elephant42

dude I really think you should consider a sideways-mounted 5-way switch for the thumbs like I did on the fulcrum. I think it would work really well on this form factor

You may be interested by the 40-key version of the Fulcrum

It's tough to use more than 2 or 3 regular thumb keys. Check out the Fulcrum for max ergo thumb functionality

I use 20 keys as my daily driver and it’s been a dream come true. My RSI disappeared and as a bonus I type faster than I did before on regular keyboard.

Fulcrum allows you to use one of the thumb joysticks as a mouse, though i wouldn't recommend it as a full mouse replacement

Although, I guess you could also go with your idea with using one hand for the vowel and one for the consonant and use just two 5way switches. There is actually a DIY keyboard with two 5way switches: https://github.com/dschil138/Fulcrum I think it would work well for kana input.

I think you would really like the fulcrum

I doubt this will be what you are looking for but I did the same thing with the keylogger and had the same realization, which heavily informed my keymap and hardware design on the Fulcrum. Full keymap is at the bottom of the readme page. Also if you go to my profile I have a pinned repo on key press stats that you may find interesting.

Fulcrum would be either your dream keyboard or your nightmare keyboard. Not sure which

I humbly suggest the 40-key version of the Fulcrum, which will give your thumbs a multitude of ergonomic options

Elephant42 and KLOR – but 1 less pinky key

Maybe the elephant42 if you can make do with over less key in the outermost columns 😬

Elephant42 – 4 thumb keys

The spacers I used are 8mm brass standoffs because I used the same layers as described in the Elephant42 repo but if I only used a 3mm switch plate, I'm sure you could use 6mm standoffs.

Fwiw I'm currently daily driving an elephant42 with a custom layout that does not use the outermost column. Given its pinky stagger and 4 relatively easily reachable thumb cluster, I could envision it to be an option.

Current is elephant42 with Boba U4s and YMDK milky fog keycaps.

There are few presets in the elephant42 for the RGB. Is there any way to define colors on my choice. For example if I want to select the RGB color for each key individually myself? Thanks

elephant42. https://github.com/illness072/elephant42