Can You Crack This? That Forgotten Netherlands Creation Which Shaped the Contemporary Globe
One can find many candidates for the designation as “world’s greatest innovation.” The wheel. The printing press. The steam engine.
As per a new book, however, that honor should go to the automated sawmill conceived by Dutchman Corneliszoon van Uitgeest during 1593.
“Prior to automated sawing, building a simple merchant vessel required around 10 lumberjacks working over three months,” notes the author. “Using wind-powered sawmills, an identical amount of processed timber might be produced within a week.”
Owing to this rapid mechanical cutter, which converted timber into boards with virtually no manual labor, the Dutch could construct vessels faster than anyone else, which sparked one hundred years of Netherlands naval, economic and artistic dominance in the continent and the globe.
The Original True Manufacturing Device
The inventor's lumber mill, contends Dávila, represented “mankind’s initial authentic factory apparatus.” A wind turbine turned a wheel. A single part transformed its circular movement into vertical motion to power the cutting blade. A separate mechanism changed the rotary motion into a sideway’s motion feeding the timber toward the cutter. A geared mechanism moved the wood forward a measured step per stroke.
“Each element was modest on its own. Corneliszoon’s brilliance was to integrate them so the machine operated in a perfectly controlled sequence, sawing on every downward motion and advancing on every upward stroke. It was an astonishingly intelligent application of fundamental components.”
A fact that leads us up to today’s puzzle. The task is for you to reimagine one of the fundamental ideas behind this historic invention.
Round and Up
Design a mechanism that turns rotary motion into vertical motion. You have these items exclusively: A spinning wheel. Two pins. Two rods. A “sleeve”, that is a cylinder or sleeve through which a single the bars will fit perfectly. (Assume you can mount components on a stand, so that the components do not fall down.)
The solution returns later today UK featuring the answer.
Meanwhile, PLEASE NO HINTS. Instead, please suggest (less celebrated) contenders for the world’s most impactful invention.
