Zane,

My late Great Uncle was a watch repairer and I still have his old bench somewhere down in my cellar. It has a small strip of wood around the edges forming a wall to stop items being fed to the gremlins. Essential as he was disabled and probably impossible for him to scrabble around on the floor. Never met him personally as he snuffed it the year I was born, over 70 years ago! Also get/make a magnetic pickup or a 3 prong claw on springs device, probably Proops flog that sort of thing and it will grab all non magnetic items. Bigger/heavier items could be dealt with by a common litter picker/helping hand. I have in the past just used a thin section 2ft steel bar with a magnet stuck by it's own power to the bottom or business end. BTW, I also have an extending tube device with a mirror on the end, complete with led light. Have used all these devices in anger over the years, with emphasis on anger and frustration! And much bad language. Hope above suggestions prove helpful.

John

I need a Heath Robinson type of inventor to design and patent a raising floor I press a button, or wind a crank to raise the floor up to waist level

First of all you need a floor that tilts – so that anything that has been dropped will roll to the lower corner.🙂

I used to find that trouser turnups were very useful for catching dropped items. I no longer have turnups on my trousers so I recently put down some cheap laminate flooring in my workshop. It's much easier to keep clean but things dropped on it tend to bounce and skitter. The solution has turned out to be surprisingly simple – when I drop something I make a mental note of where it fell and look somewhere else.

If it's something heavy or with sharp corners it's easier to see where it fell – I just look for the scar in the flooring.

George B.