Are You Able to Solve This? That Forgotten Netherlands Invention That Forged our Modern Globe
There are numerous contenders to claim the designation as “world’s greatest innovation.” The circular axle. The printing press. The steam engine.
As per a new book, though, that honor belongs to a mechanised timber mill invented through Dutchman Cornelis Corneliszoon in 1593.
“Prior to mechanised cutting, constructing a simple merchant vessel necessitated approximately 10 lumberjacks laboring for three months,” notes Jaime Dávila. “With wind-powered lumber mills, the same quantity of cut lumber could be manufactured within seven days.”
Owing to their rapid mechanical saw, that turned logs into planks with almost no human effort, the Dutch could construct vessels more quickly compared to any other nation, which unleashed one hundred years of Dutch naval, economic as well as artistic dominance in Europe and the globe.
The First True Industrial Device
The inventor's sawmill, argues Dávila, was “humanity’s initial authentic factory machine.” A windmill rotated a gear. One component converted the rotary motion to vertical motion for the saw. Another component changed that same rotary movement into a sideway’s motion feeding the log to the blade. A ratchet system shifted the wood forward one precise increment each stroke.
“Every component was modest on its own. Corneliszoon’s brilliance was to integrate these parts in order that the machine acted in a perfectly controlled sequence, cutting with each downward stroke and advancing with each upward stroke. This constituted a remarkably clever use of fundamental components.”
Which brings us up to the current challenge. The task is for you to reinvent one of the basic ideas underpinning this historic machine.
Round and Up
Construct a mechanism that turns circular movement to up-and-down motion. Your available these components only: A rotating disc. Two pegs. Two rods. A “guide”, that is a cylinder or sleeve into which one of the bars will fit snugly. (Consider that it is possible to mount components on a stand, so the parts don’t collapse.)
The solution returns later today UK time with the solution.
Meanwhile, PLEASE NO HINTS. Instead, feel free to propose (non obvious) candidates as the world’s greatest invention.
