Modifying mouse to make the keys easy to trigger?

the_cusser_man96

My problem: After a days of heavy clicking, My thumb, index and middle fingers really hurt. For reference, I've been using LogitechG604. Using it for heavy modelling or animation, hurts like hell.

Its not the mouse but my hand so buying another mouse will do me no good

I want to modify the mouse to make it better. I know it means I will need to get my hands dirty and will also run through a few models before success. I am no stranger to DIY.

What routes can I take? I have opened it up once, I can probably find third party Left/Right clicks that are designed for light clicking but am worried about the middle click, the worst offender. Its really hard to press.

Also the mouse has 6 right buttons, Any ideas how I can make them easy to press down?

Any advice, possible ideas or solutions would be appreciated. Thank you!

poopipe

Obviously I can't feel what you're feeling but I don't think changing the actuating force of your buttons will make much difference. The problem most likely comes from from holding the buttons down while moving stuff around, using menu gestures etc..

I solved long standing knuckle, hand, forearm and shoulder pain by getting a gaming keypad and mapping my mouse buttons to keys on that - this removed the need to grip the mouse while moving it around and took a huge amount of strain off my arm and hand and also has benefits for your other arm.
I would strongly recommend looking at something like that - it also allows you to switch to a vertical mouse without suffering the first click shifting issues that are inherent to their design.

Fiddling with the mouse switches sounds fun so no reason not to do it if you can find the bits.
my kids have adopted roccat and glorious mice for gaming due to their buttons being super fast and them sliding super smoothly on deskpads (nerds) so they might be an option if the Logitech proves unmoddable

thomasp

First thing I'd do is to map the middle click to a thumb button and try to get used to using that. Middle click via middle finger is just terrible IMO, even more so when it's a clickable scrollwheel. It may well solve most of your issues in one go if you can relax your hand a little this way.

Beyond that it may be the shape/size of the mouse as well as the firmness of the buttons. You can experiment with different kinds of mice there or look at e.g. working with a tablet instead. I doubt there is much that can be done to make the buttons on your existing mouse feel more pleasant to press.

birb

thomasp said:

First thing I'd do is to map the middle click to a thumb button and try to get used to using that. Middle click via middle finger is just terrible IMO, even more so when it's a clickable scrollwheel. It may well solve most of your issues in one go if you can relax your hand a little this way.

That's exactly what I did and I'm never looking back! The middle button position isn't ergonomic by default and this is compounded by narrowness, curvature and stiffness of the majority of scroll wheels. Most operations that require click and dragging involve this button, so mapping it to a thumb button—usually perfectly positioned under where the finger naturally rests, with the thumb also being the sturdiest finger—gives the hand a rest.

Watch out for the size of the mouse as well. It definitively can't be too big or oddly-shaped for your hand or you'll be forced to splay it over the mouse, increasing tension and the resulting pain.

Alex_J

I second the others - I use a gaming pad and thumb click for middle button on a logitech g502. Very ergonomic and faster to work once you muscle memory the buttons.

More sensitive buttons I think might actually cause more problem. Kind of like a hair trigger on a gun, it means you'd need to "hover" more carefully which is more stress than letting gravity do its work. I think the stress mostly comes from static lifting and holding, not pressing.

pior

"Using it for heavy modelling or animation, hurts like hell."

Here's a curveball : the culprit is probably not the mouse but rather the software itself. For instance in the vast majority of 3d programs moving an object involves clicking precisely on it, dragging it with a mouse button down, and releasing. This might not seem like much (since this is pretty much the standard) but this is stressing for the wrist over time, especially if the application is not very good at determining what you are actually clicking on to begin with.

You might want to investigate if your program allows you to work like so : 

> tap a key to enable a transformation mode
> move the mouse (without any button held down) to perform the transformation
> confirm.

This is the way Blender works (now also accepting regular "button down" manipulation too) and it is a big difference compared to Max and Maya. As it is combined with excellent prediction as to which component you are trying to click, in my opnion it makes it vastly superior to the competition when it comes to scene/object manipulation. It just "feels lighter", so to speak.

This paradigm also allows you to not even need to have your mouse pointer anywhere near the object you are manipulating since all transformation are relative and represented by a transpose line, so that is another great plus (similar to the Move/Rotate/Scale commands in CAD programs). It's especially nice for posing, as it allows to work without having to manipulate rig controls in a tedious way.