Are You Able to Crack It? That Forgotten Dutch Creation That Shaped our Contemporary Globe
There are numerous candidates for the title of “world’s most significant innovation.” The wheel. The printing press. The combustion motor.
According to a new book, however, that honor should go to a mechanised sawmill invented by Dutch inventor Cornelis Corneliszoon during 1593.
“Before automated sawing, building a simple merchant vessel required approximately ten sawyers laboring for three months,” notes the author. “With wind-driven sawmills, an identical amount of cut lumber might be produced in less than a week.”
Owing to their rapid mechanical cutter, that converted logs to planks using virtually no human effort, Dutch builders were able to construct vessels faster than any other nation, an advantage that unleashed a century of Netherlands naval, economic as well as artistic supremacy in Europe and the globe.
The Original Genuine Industrial Machine
Corneliszoon’s lumber mill, contends the writer, represented “humanity’s initial true factory machine.” A windmill turned a gear. One component transformed the circular movement to vertical motion to power the saw. Another component transformed the rotary movement into a sideway’s motion advancing the timber toward the blade. A geared mechanism moved the wood forward one precise increment each stroke.
“Every component seemed modest by itself. The Dutchman’s brilliance was to integrate these parts so they operated in a perfectly controlled order, sawing with each descending motion while moving on every upward stroke. This constituted an astonishingly clever use of fundamental parts.”
Which leads us to the current challenge. I’d like you to reimagine one of the fundamental ideas behind this historic invention.
Circular to Vertical
Design a machine which converts circular motion into up-and-down motion. Your available these items only: A spinning wheel. Two pegs. Two bars. A “guide”, that is a tube or sleeve through which a single the bars can slide snugly. (Assume you can put things on a stand, so that the parts don’t fall down.)
The solution returns at 5pm UK time with the solution.
Meanwhile, NO SPOILERS. Instead, please propose (non obvious) contenders as the world’s most impactful creation.
