How are the three position switches of the primary switching center operated?

Knife switches consist of a flat metal blade, hinged at one end, with an insulating handle for operation, and a fixed contact. When the switch is closed, current flows through the hinged pivot and blade and through the fixed contact. Such switches are usually not enclosed.

The knife and contacts are typically formed of copper, steel, or brass, depending on the application. Fixed contacts may be backed up with a spring. Several parallel blades can be operated at the same time by one handle.

The parts may be mounted on an insulating base with terminals for wiring, or may be directly bolted to an insulated switch board in a large assembly. Since the electrical contacts are exposed, the switch is used only where people cannot accidentally come in contact with the switch or where the voltage is so low as to not present a hazard. Knife switches are made in many sizes from miniature switches to large devices used to carry thousands of amperes.

In electrical transmission and distribution, gang-operated switches are used in circuits up to the highest voltages. The disadvantages of the knife switch are the slow opening speed and the proximity of the operator to exposed live parts. Metal-enclosed safety disconnect switches are used for isolation of circuits in industrial power distribution.

Sometimes spring-loaded auxiliary blades are fitted which momentarily carry the full current during opening, then quickly part to rapidly extinguish the arc. A footswitch is a rugged switch which is operated by foot pressure. An example of use is for the control of a machine tool so that the operator has both hands free to manipulate the workpiece.

The foot control of an electric guitar is also a switch. A DPDT switch has six connections, but since polarity reversal is a very common usage of DPDT switches, some variations of the DPDT switch are internally wired specifically for polarity reversal. These crossover switches only have four terminals rather than six.

Two of the terminals are inputs and two are outputs. When connected to a battery or other DC source, the 4-way switch selects from either normal or reversed polarity. Such switches can also be used as intermediate switches in a multiway switching system for control of lamps by more than two switches.

In building wiring, light switches are installed at convenient locations to control lighting and occasionally other circuits. By use of multiple-pole switches, multiway switching control of a lamp can be obtained from two or more places, such as the ends of a corridor or stairwell. A wireless light switch allows remote control of lamps for convenience; some lamps include a touch switch which electronically controls the lamp if touched anywhere.

In public buildings several types of vandal resistant switch are used to prevent unauthorized use. A relay is an electrically operated switch. Many relays use an electromagnet to operate a switching mechanism mechanically, but other operating principles are also used.

Solid-state relays control power circuits with no moving parts, instead using a semiconductor device to perform switching—often a silicon-controlled rectifier or triac. The analogue switch uses two MOSFET transistors in a transmission gate arrangement as a switch that works much like a relay, with some advantages and several limitations compared to an electromechanical relay. The power transistor(s) in a switching voltage regulator, such as a power supply unit, are used like a switch to alternately let power flow and block power from flowing.

Many people use metonymy to call a variety of devices "switches" that conceptually connect or disconnect signals and communication paths between electrical devices, analogous to the way mechanical switches connect and disconnect paths for electrons to flow between two conductors. Early telephone systems used an automatically operated Strowger switch to connect telephone callers; telephone exchanges contain one or more crossbar switches today. Since the advent of digital logic in the 1950s, the term switch has spread to a variety of digital active devices such as transistors and logic gates whose function is to change their output state between two logic levels or connect different signal lines, and even computers, network switches, whose function is to provide connections between different ports in a computer network.

12 The term 'switched' is also applied to telecommunications networks, and signifies a network that is circuit switched, providing dedicated circuits for communication between end nodes, such as the public switched telephone network. The common feature of all these usages is they refer to devices that control a binary state: they are either on or off, closed or open, connected or not connected. Types of switches ON-ON, ON-(ON), etc.