Detent - Examples

Examples

A well-known example of a detent can be seen on the popular game show "Wheel Of Fortune", which employs rubber "fingers" to stop the wheel at valid points after the wheel is spun by a contestant. Other common examples include:

  • A balance control on a piece of stereo equipment which seems to "click" or "snap" into the center position of its rotation, indicating the point where the volumes of the left and right channels are equal or "balanced", or volume controls with a separate detent to match each of the digits on the control knob (typically 10).
  • Rotary switches typically employ detents to keep the control shaft properly aligned with the appropriate contact.
  • Any spring-powered wind-up toy employs one, in order to disallow unwinding of the spring.
  • The ratchet wrench, which interestingly is employed to intentionally use force against the detent and comes in increasing variety of types. It was designed to allow one to keep the wrench engaged with the bolt or nut which it is turning, in an area where the swing arc of the wrench is limited, while being able to continue to turn it in one direction by simply pulling the handle back and letting the detent reposition itself. The repositioning allows the wrench to be forcibly turned again.
  • The scroll wheels on many computer mice employ detents to divide scrolling into discrete steps.

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