Any time you have the public touching a common interface, whether that’s an ATM or soda fountain kiosk, durability has to be a main concern. If you’re faced with the task of creating a public terminal keypad for your business, this is a main factor to take into consideration.
From card swipers to ticket vending machines, public terminals are everywhere. Your terminal could easily be touched by hundreds or thousands of people a day! That’s a lot of abuse from people who are jabbing at buttons, sometimes in frustration. As a result, you need that terminal to be designed with durability in mind, especially when it comes to the keypad.
Consider crafting your keypad from the most versatile material on the market today: silicone. It doesn’t break easily and it can withstand a lot of use on a daily basis. It’s commonplace for us to type information into public terminals, but all that repetitiveness can take a toll on the interface over time.
Why You Need the Durability of Silicone
Silicone is an ideal material if you want your application to be able to withstand constant wear and tear. That’s because silicone is:
1. Resistant to Abuse and Repetition
Silicone rubber can stay functional even with constant use all day long. Plus, it resists extreme temperatures, chemicals, and bacteria growth – of critical importance when you have many humans touching the same surface daily. This keeps users from spreading germs, plus the silicone itself can easily tolerate strong cleaning solutions applied regularly.
2. Easy to Operate
Simplicity is just as important as durability. With so many users interacting with the terminal, the keypad has to be easy to use and troubleshoot. To facilitate this, you may want to incorporate:
- Spaces between buttons to prevent mistyping
- Color-coded controls
- Functional groupings of buttons
- Simple graphics over lettering
3. Waterproof and Dustproof
One of the biggest benefits of silicone is that it’s water and dust proof. This is a critical factor in public terminals because you just don’t know what conditions it will be subjected to on any given day. From soda spills to dirt, you need a high-grade rubber and silicone material that will easily withstand all that wear and tear.
In the end, silicone keypads for public terminals are a wise choice because they’re comfortable, ergonomic and cost effective – not to mention they can integrate into large-scale applications very easily.
Contact SiTech
Silicone Technology Corp is your go-to local expert for the manufacture of durable custom keypads for public use. To learn more, contact Si-Tech today at 757-887-8488.
