Can You Crack It? The Overlooked Netherlands Invention That Forged the Modern Globe
One can find many candidates to claim the designation as “world’s most significant invention.” The circular axle. The printing press. The steam engine.
As per a recent publication, though, that title should go to a automated sawmill invented by Dutchman Corneliszoon van Uitgeest during 1593.
“Prior to mechanised cutting, constructing a modest merchant vessel required approximately 10 sawyers working over three months,” writes the author. “Using wind-driven lumber mills, an identical quantity of cut lumber could be produced in less than a week.”
Owing to this speedy mechanical saw, which turned logs to boards using almost no human effort, Dutch builders were able to build ships faster than anyone else, an advantage that unleashed one hundred years of Netherlands naval, economic as well as cultural dominance in the continent and the world.
The First Genuine Industrial Device
Corneliszoon’s lumber mill, argues the writer, was “humanity’s initial true factory machine.” A windmill rotated a wheel. A single part converted its rotary motion to vertical motion to power the cutting blade. A separate mechanism changed the rotary movement into a lateral movement advancing the log to the blade. A geared mechanism moved the wood forward a measured step per stroke.
“Each element seemed modest on its own. Corneliszoon’s brilliance was to integrate them so they acted within a precisely synchronized sequence, cutting on every downward stroke while moving with each upward motion. It was a remarkably clever use of basic parts.”
A fact that brings us to the current puzzle. The task is you to reimagine a key the fundamental ideas behind Corneliszoon’s machine.
Circular to Vertical
Construct a mechanism which converts rotary motion to vertical motion. You have these components exclusively: A spinning wheel. Two pegs. Two rods. A “guide”, which is a tube or housing through which one of the bars will fit snugly. (Consider that you can put things on a base, so that the components don’t fall down.)
I’ll be back at 5pm UK featuring the answer.
Meanwhile, NO SPOILERS. Rather, feel free to suggest (less celebrated) candidates as the planet’s greatest invention.
