I love trying unique switches from small vendors on this channel,
but rarely are they ever tactile. So when I got voyager switches from chosfox, I was actually
pleasantly surprised. But do they stack up against other known tactiles in its expensive price point?
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Now for the specs. Voyagers are tactiles with a 62.5 gram
double stage spring. The top housing is polycarb, bottom is nylon, and stem is POM. nothing new.
These switches are 5 pin and do have factory lube. They are long poles.
Finally, voyagers are 70 cents a piece, placing them in the premium switch category.
These switches sound incredibly clean and clear right out of the box. There is almost
no top out sound, which definitely helps with this. My only gripe is the leaf noise. It’s
not terrible in most configurations, but my very sensitive microphone and the tape modded ciel PCB
allow you to hear every tiny imperfection. Ultimately the extra leaf noise makes the
switches sound pretty sharp. To me, it’s louder than the leaf noise in holy bobas,
and this could be due to holy bobas louder topping out masking the extra sound.
Volume wise, voyagers are loud, being around the same volume as holy bobas,
if not a tad bit louder. They are higher pitched than holy bobas,
although not as high as mint chocolate chips. Compared to the momoka sharks, they are lower
pitched than both the top and bottom out. I would actually consider these slightly
more tactile than holy bobas. The double stage spring combined with the shorter bottom out
distance makes it feel snappier. And because the bump is pretty much the entire travel distance,
there’s really no need to worry about smoothness at
all. The linear portion is a little bit scratchy, but it’s not even noticeable.
Speaking of smoothness, let's look at the factory lube. It looks pretty evenly spread,
with no big globs anywhere. I’m happy to say that it’s also consistent across the batch.
Voyagers don’t handle stem wobble incredibly well, and I already mentioned how this
affects the sound. There is significant side to side and up and down wobble.
With voyagers being 70 cents a piece, they aren’t exactly easy on the bank. But they hit all the
right marks, and compete very well with the likes of mint chocolate chips, which have the same
price, and holy bobas, which are even more. Also not leaving out Boba U4 thocks, which are slightly
less at 65 cents a piece. They’re all great stock, so it simply comes down to your choice of pitch,
and fine tuning your boards feel. You really can’t go wrong with any of these,
and Voyagers offer a new avenue for premium tactile enthusiasts to explore.