You'd be surprised at how unsophisticated some things are. I always took it
for granted that the shake switch in the washing machine was something
exotic until I saw ours. Nylon "finger" depressing a length of wire. Any
shake, slides off and trips the microswitch.

Also slides off and won't spin if the wife lets the lid slam ....

"Owen Lowe" wrote in message
news
In article
,
"Leo Lichtman" wrote:

How about a pendulum with a coffee cup in the path of its arc? The cup
is
on one end of a teeter-totter, with a ball balanced on the other end.
When
the ball comes off, it rolls onto a chute...

Rube, zat you?