Can You Crack It? That Forgotten Netherlands Invention Which Forged the Modern World
One can find many candidates to claim the designation as “world’s most significant innovation.” The circular axle. The movable type. The steam engine.
As per a new book, though, that honor should go to the mechanised timber mill conceived by Dutchman Cornelis Corneliszoon during 1593.
“Prior to mechanised sawing, constructing a modest merchant vessel required approximately ten lumberjacks laboring for three months,” writes Jaime Dávila. “Using wind-driven sawmills, the same quantity of processed timber might be manufactured in less than seven days.”
Thanks to this speedy automated saw, that converted logs into planks using virtually no human effort, Dutch builders could construct ships more quickly compared to anyone else, an advantage that unleashed a century of Dutch naval, economic and cultural dominance in Europe and the globe.
The Original True Manufacturing Machine
The inventor's sawmill, contends the writer, represented “mankind’s first authentic factory machine.” A wind turbine turned a wheel. One component converted its rotary motion into up-and-down motion to power the cutting blade. A separate mechanism changed that same spinning movement into a lateral motion feeding the timber to the blade. A ratchet system shifted the wood forward one precise increment each cycle.
“Every component was simple by itself. Corneliszoon’s brilliance was to integrate them in order that the machine acted in a precisely synchronized order, cutting on every downward stroke and moving with each upward motion. It was a remarkably clever application of basic parts.”
Which leads us to today’s puzzle. The task is you to reimagine one of the basic ideas underpinning this historic machine.
Round and Up
Construct a machine which converts circular movement into vertical motion. Your available these components only: A rotating disc. Two pins. Two rods. A “sleeve”, that is a tube or housing into which one of the bars can slide snugly. (Consider that you can mount components on a stand, so that the components don’t collapse.)
I’ll be back at 5pm UK with the answer.
In the interim, PLEASE NO HINTS. Rather, feel free to suggest (less celebrated) contenders for the world’s greatest creation.
