Can You Crack It? That Overlooked Dutch Creation Which Shaped the Modern Globe
There are numerous contenders for the title of “planet’s most significant invention.” The circular axle. The printing press. The combustion motor.
As per a new book, though, that title belongs to the automated timber mill conceived through Dutchman Cornelis Corneliszoon during 1593.
“Before automated sawing, building a modest trading ship necessitated around ten lumberjacks working for 90 days,” notes Jaime Dávila. “Using wind-powered sawmills, an identical quantity of processed timber might be produced in less than seven days.”
Thanks to their rapid mechanical saw, that turned logs into boards with virtually no manual labor, Dutch builders could construct vessels faster than anyone else, which unleashed a century of Netherlands maritime, financial and cultural supremacy across Europe and the world.
The Original Genuine Industrial Machine
Corneliszoon’s sawmill, argues Dávila, was “mankind’s initial authentic industrial machine.” A windmill rotated a wheel. One component converted its rotary movement into up-and-down action to power the saw. A separate mechanism changed that same rotary motion into a sideway’s motion feeding the timber toward the blade. A geared mechanism shifted the log ahead one precise increment each cycle.
“Every component was modest on its own. The Dutchman’s genius lay in how to integrate these parts so they acted in a precisely synchronized order, cutting on every downward stroke while advancing on every upward motion. This constituted an astonishingly clever use of fundamental parts.”
Which brings us to the current challenge. I’d like for you to reinvent one of the basic ideas behind Corneliszoon’s invention.
Circular to Vertical
Design a machine which converts rotary motion to up-and-down action. You have these components exclusively: A rotating disc. Two pegs. Two rods. A “sleeve”, that is a tube or housing through which one of the rods can slide perfectly. (Consider that you can put things on a base, so that the components don’t collapse.)
The solution returns at 5pm UK time featuring the solution.
Meanwhile, PLEASE NO HINTS. Rather, please propose (less celebrated) candidates as the planet’s greatest invention.
