Designing a switch for a winch

This is a first test of a concept that I came up with: use a Bowden tube with a filament to operate a micro switch remotely. That micro switch activates the solenoid that powers the winch motor.

I selected a waterproof 3A micro switch with stainless steel lever that can be pushed against the switch housing without causing problems. The solenoid is a 200A version and can be controlled with 12-36V so this works for both 12V and 24V. The Bowden tube is a PTFE tube which is used in 3D printers to feed filament. The connector that holds the tube is stainless steel with M10 thread.

In the closeup picture above I use green PLA filament but in real use I would probably use polycarbonate. You can see how the filament simply pushes the lever. I’m sure you can feed the tube all the way inside to where the solenoid is, just like the old air tubes did (which started turning winches by themselves in tropical heat).

This test works brilliantly. I think I can go ahead and design buttons/knobs/pedals that connect to the other end of the Bowden tube to operate the switch. It has about 5mm travel which I think is great for a switch. Let me know what you think and if you have any ideas. One that crossed my mind is that you could remove the moving parts of that knob/pedal when not being used for a while and put a protective cover on the base instead... even removing the filament itself!