Are You Able to Solve This? The Forgotten Dutch Invention Which Shaped the Contemporary World
There are many candidates for the designation as “planet’s most significant invention.” The wheel. The printing press. The combustion motor.
As per a recent publication, however, that title belongs to the mechanised timber mill conceived through Dutchman Cornelis Corneliszoon in 1593.
“Prior to automated sawing, constructing a modest trading ship necessitated approximately 10 sawyers laboring over 90 days,” writes the author. “With wind-powered lumber mills, an identical amount of processed timber could be manufactured in less than seven days.”
Owing to their speedy mechanical cutter, that converted timber to planks with almost no human effort, the Dutch could construct ships more quickly compared to anyone else, an advantage that unleashed one hundred years of Netherlands maritime, economic and cultural supremacy across the continent and the globe.
The Original Genuine Industrial Machine
Corneliszoon’s sawmill, argues the writer, represented “mankind’s first true industrial machine.” A windmill turned a wheel. A single part transformed its circular motion to up-and-down action to power the cutting blade. Another component changed that same spinning motion into a lateral movement feeding the timber toward the cutter. A ratchet system moved the log ahead one precise increment each cycle.
“Each element was simple on its own. The Dutchman’s brilliance lay in how to integrate these parts in order that they acted in a precisely synchronized order, sawing on every descending motion while moving on every upward motion. It was a remarkably clever use of fundamental components.”
A fact that leads us to the current challenge. The task is you to reimagine one of the fundamental ideas behind Corneliszoon’s machine.
Round and Up
Construct a machine which converts rotary movement to up-and-down motion. Your available these items only: A rotating disc. Two pins. Two bars. A “guide”, which is a cylinder or sleeve through which a single the bars can slide perfectly. (Assume you can mount components on a base, so the components don’t fall down.)
I’ll be back at 5pm UK featuring the solution.
Meanwhile, PLEASE NO HINTS. Instead, feel free to suggest (non obvious) contenders as the planet’s greatest invention.
