If you’re looking for a smooth linear with a great sound profile, you cannot go wrong with the Mauve
I’ve been looking to add another JWK linear switch to my collection, and this time I chose the Mauve for its heavier spring weight of 65g. I’ve been wanting to try something slightly heavier than 62g so these seemed like a good choice, and saved me the time of having to do a spring swap. We’re not exactly breaking new ground here today, as the Mauve is a very standard JWK linear in the same vein as the Alpaca, Lilac and Banana Split. Most of the top JWK linears are very similar, with the only differences being the housing material and spring weight, and then obviously the colourways. I was expecting the Mauve to feel very similar to the Alpaca, maybe with a tiny difference in sound because of the PC/Nylon blended top housing.
The Mauve features a Nylon bottom housing with a PC/Nylon blended top. The stem is made of POM and we have a gold-plated spring. Very standard stuff as far as a JWK linear is concerned. I did find that the Mauve is using an older version of the linear mold. You can see here that it doesn’t match the Alpaca v2, with the most obvious difference being the slider rails that aren’t tapered, something that was introduced on the v2 mold. This is probably just an older batch of Mauves, as I would assume that JWK are running the latest mold on these.
The out of the box smoothness of JWK linears is unmatched, and like the Alpacas, the Mauves felt silky smooth right off the bat. The downstroke feels virtually frictionless, and this is one of the reasons I’ve become such a big fan of JWK linears. The Mauve has a light application of factory lube on the stem legs and slider rails. I wouldn’t say the factory lube is terribly consistent, and on some switches only half the slider rail was covered, but the Mauves had a consistent sound nonetheless.
The stock performance of the Mauves was among the best of any JWK I’ve used, especially with reference to the metal ping. Out of the 70 switches, only about four or five had perceptible metal ping. The Mauve has a really nice stock sound, so these switches are perfectly fine to use as is. This makes the Mauve a great option for users that aren’t looking to mod. If I had to use a JWK switch stock, this would probably be my choice.
As good as the stock sound is, I find JWK linears a little bit thin and high pitched. I like to lube and film to add some deepness and richness to the sound. The lube on the bottom housing floor also softens and deepens the bottom out, as the stock bottom out is somewhat thin and plasticky. You’ll notice that the lubed sound has this nice rich and creamy quality, which is missing from the stock sound. But as per usual, sound is subjective so take what I say with a grain of salt. Unsurprisingly the Mauve sounded almost identical to the Alpaca, especially when lubed. I honestly couldn’t tell the difference between the lubed sound tests. As far as the stock sound, the Mauve had a slightly more muted top out sound because of the PC/Nylon blend, but the difference is infinitesimal.
The Mauve’s colour scheme looked kind of dull in the pictures, but in real life the switches actually look really good.
The housing tolerance and stem wobble is pretty much a formality. We know by now that the housing tolerances are very good and the stem wobble is extremely low on JWK linears. As expected, the stem wobble is very low on the East-West line and a little bit more pronounced on the North-South. Even after opening and closing the switches, the housing felt very tight and the only reason I filmed was for sound.
So in conclusion, not much to see here, the Mauve was unsurprisingly excellent. I felt that it would be a nice addition to my switch collection, so the write-up was a bonus. If you’re looking for a smooth linear with a great sound profile, you cannot go wrong with the Mauve.
headtr1p 