Are You Able to Solve This? The Forgotten Dutch Creation Which Forged our Modern World
One can find numerous candidates for the designation as “planet’s greatest innovation.” The circular axle. The printing press. The steam engine.
As per a recent publication, though, that title should go to the mechanised sawmill conceived by Dutchman Corneliszoon van Uitgeest in 1593.
“Prior to automated sawing, constructing a simple trading ship necessitated around ten lumberjacks laboring over three months,” writes Jaime Dávila. “With wind-powered lumber mills, an identical amount of cut lumber might be produced within seven days.”
Thanks to this rapid automated saw, that turned timber into boards with virtually no human effort, the Dutch were able to construct ships faster compared to any other nation, which unleashed a century of Dutch naval, economic as well as artistic supremacy in the continent and the world.
The Original True Manufacturing Machine
Corneliszoon’s sawmill, contends the writer, was “mankind’s first authentic industrial machine.” A wind turbine rotated a wheel. A single part transformed its rotary motion into up-and-down motion for the cutting blade. Another component changed the spinning motion into a sideway’s motion feeding the timber toward the blade. A geared mechanism moved the log forward a measured step each cycle.
“Every component was modest on its own. Corneliszoon’s genius lay in how to combine them in order that they operated in a perfectly controlled sequence, sawing on every descending stroke and advancing with each upward motion. It was an astonishingly intelligent application of basic components.”
Which brings us up to the current puzzle. I’d like for you to reinvent one of the basic concepts underpinning Corneliszoon’s invention.
Circular to Vertical
Construct a mechanism that turns rotary motion into vertical motion. You have these components exclusively: A spinning wheel. Two pegs. Two bars. A “sleeve”, which is a tube or sleeve into which one of the rods will fit snugly. (Consider that you can put things on a stand, so that the parts don’t fall down.)
The solution returns later today UK featuring the answer.
Meanwhile, PLEASE NO HINTS. Instead, feel free to propose (less celebrated) contenders for the planet’s most impactful invention.
