[texhax] Lowered \hat accent

[Joel Salomon]

In a paper dicussing the "unit vectors" $\hat\imath$, $\hat\jmath$,
and $\hat k$, is there some way to put the hat accent over the body of
the letter 'k' rather than over its ascender?  I'd prefer a method
that automatically computes the position from font information, if
such exists, but hacks and kludges are fine.

I've tried to use the code someone suggested for \gammabar, but it's a
pain to get right.

My request probably violates a whole slew of typographial conventions,
but TeX's math accents do look a bit silly atop tall lower-case
letters and I'd like that "foolish consistency" in my unit vectors.

Of course, a pointer to the relevant TeX documentation is just as helpful.

Thanks,
--Joel