Can You Crack It? The Overlooked Dutch Invention That Forged our Contemporary World
One can find many candidates for the designation as “world’s greatest invention.” The circular axle. The movable type. The combustion motor.
According to a recent publication, however, that honor should go to a mechanised sawmill conceived by Dutch inventor Corneliszoon van Uitgeest during 1593.
“Before mechanised sawing, building a modest merchant vessel required approximately ten sawyers laboring for 90 days,” writes the author. “Using wind-driven sawmills, an identical quantity of cut lumber might be manufactured in less than seven days.”
Owing to their rapid automated saw, which converted logs to boards with virtually no human effort, Dutch builders were able to build vessels faster compared to anyone else, which unleashed one hundred years of Netherlands maritime, financial and artistic supremacy in the continent and the globe.
The Original Genuine Manufacturing Device
Corneliszoon’s sawmill, contends Dávila, was “humanity’s first authentic industrial apparatus.” A windmill turned a wheel. A single part transformed its circular motion into up-and-down action to power the saw. A separate mechanism transformed the spinning motion into a lateral movement feeding the log to the cutter. A geared mechanism moved the log ahead a measured step per stroke.
“Every component seemed modest by itself. The Dutchman’s genius was to integrate them so the machine operated in a perfectly controlled order, sawing on every downward motion and advancing with each upward motion. It was an astonishingly clever application of fundamental components.”
Which leads us up to the current puzzle. I’d like you to reinvent a key the basic concepts behind Corneliszoon’s machine.
Round and Up
Design a mechanism that turns rotary movement into up-and-down action. You have these items only: A spinning wheel. Two pegs. Two bars. A “sleeve”, that is a tube or housing into which one of the bars will fit perfectly. (Consider that it is possible to mount components on a stand, so the parts don’t fall down.)
The solution returns at 5pm UK time featuring the solution.
Meanwhile, PLEASE NO HINTS. Rather, please suggest (non obvious) candidates as the world’s greatest invention.
