Can You Crack This? The Overlooked Dutch Invention Which Shaped our Modern Globe
One can find numerous contenders to claim the title of “world’s greatest invention.” The circular axle. The movable type. The steam engine.
As per a recent publication, however, that honor belongs to the automated sawmill invented through Dutch inventor Corneliszoon van Uitgeest during 1593.
“Before automated cutting, constructing a simple trading ship necessitated approximately 10 sawyers laboring over three months,” notes Jaime Dávila. “Using wind-driven lumber mills, an identical amount of cut lumber could be manufactured within seven days.”
Thanks to their rapid automated saw, that turned timber into planks with virtually no manual labor, the Dutch could construct ships more quickly compared to any other nation, which sparked one hundred years of Netherlands naval, financial as well as artistic dominance in the continent and the globe.
The Original Genuine Manufacturing Machine
Corneliszoon’s lumber mill, contends the writer, was “mankind’s initial authentic industrial machine.” A windmill rotated a wheel. One component transformed the rotary motion to up-and-down motion to power the saw. A separate mechanism transformed the rotary movement into a lateral movement feeding the log to the blade. A geared mechanism shifted the log forward a measured step each stroke.
“Every component seemed simple by itself. Corneliszoon’s brilliance lay in how to integrate these parts so they acted within a perfectly controlled sequence, sawing with each downward motion while moving on every upward stroke. This constituted an astonishingly intelligent use of fundamental parts.”
Which leads us up to today’s puzzle. The task is you to reinvent one of the fundamental concepts behind Corneliszoon’s machine.
Circular to Vertical
Design a machine which converts circular movement into vertical motion. Your available these components only: A rotating disc. Two pins. Two bars. A “guide”, which is a cylinder or housing into which a single the rods will fit perfectly. (Assume you can mount components on a base, so that the components don’t fall down.)
The solution returns at 5pm UK time with the answer.
Meanwhile, PLEASE NO HINTS. Instead, feel free to propose (non obvious) contenders as the world’s most impactful creation.
