Control system utilizing momentary switching devices

Claim 1

In an apparatus having a plurality of machine functions and a control system for controlling activation and deactivation of said machine functions, said control system including programming means having N momentary switching devices for programming desired operational modes of said apparatus and function control means for activating and deactivating said machine functions in accordance with predetermined operational sequences associated with said operational modes, the improvement wherein said control system further comprises: gate circuit means responsive to said N momentary switching devices for latching said control system in at least N+1 operational modes, said gate circuit means including at least two bistable multivibrator circuits and each of said bistable multivibrator circuits includes a plurality of multiple input inverting logic gates each having an output electrically coupled to an input of at least one other of said logic gates, at least N of said inverting logic gates have inuts electrically coupled to said momentary switching devices whereby activating any one of said N momentary switching devices causes at least one of said inverting logic gates to make a logical one (1) to logical zero (0) transition and at least another of said inverting logic gates to make a logical zero (0) to logical one (1) transition thereby latching said control system in at least one of said N+1 operational modes, said function control means responsive to said gate circuit means whereby said machine functions are activated and deactivated in accordance with said predetermined operational sequences, and timing means responsive to said function control means for determining timing cycles for operational sequences of at least N of said N+1 operational modes.