Control apparatus primarily intended for use with stoves employing induction heating

An apparatus having an induction heating coil means and a circuit means including energy release means for supplying variable amounts of electric power to said induction heating coil, said circuit means being connected to said heating coil in which the improvement comprises:

• a water impervious, glass plate serving as a cook top,
• an electrically powered bar graph display means for indicating the amount of electric power supplied to said heating coil by the length of a visible line,
• said bar graph display means being located on the undersurface of said cook top and being visible through said cook top,
• an operation control means for controlling the operation of said circuit means and said bar graph display means in synchronism with one another so that said display means at all times indicates the amount of electric power supplied to said heating coil, said operation control means being connected to said circuit means and said bar graph display means,
• two separate control actuator switch means for use in setting the amount of energy released by said release means, each of said actuator switch means being connected to said operation control means,
• one of said control actuator switch means for causing, upon actuation, said operation control means to increase the amount of electric power supplied to said heating coil, the other of said control actuator switch means being capable of being actuated so as to cause said operation control means to decrease the amount of electric power supplied to said heating coil,
• each of said control actuator switch means comprising a proximity switch means capable of providing an output to said operation control means,
• each of said control actuator switch means being mounted on said cook top and being capable of being actuated from above said cook top,
• separate latch means for rendering said control actuator switch means operative connected to said operation control means,
• said separate latch means comprising a series of other, separate latch switch means for providing signals to a decoder means and a decoder means for providing a signal in response to a predetermined signal from said other, separate latch switch means, said operation control means being responsive to said signal from said decoder means so as to render said control actuator switch means operative,
• each of said other separate latch switch means of said latch means comprises proximity switch means capable of providing an output to said decoder means.