Can You Crack This? The Overlooked Dutch Invention Which Forged the Contemporary Globe
One can find many candidates to claim the title of “world’s most significant invention.” The wheel. The movable type. The combustion motor.
As per a new book, though, that honor should go to a mechanised sawmill conceived by Dutchman Cornelis Corneliszoon during 1593.
“Before automated cutting, constructing a simple merchant vessel required approximately ten sawyers working for 90 days,” writes the author. “Using wind-driven sawmills, the same amount of processed timber could be manufactured in less than seven days.”
Thanks to their rapid mechanical cutter, which turned timber into planks with virtually no manual labor, the Dutch could build vessels more quickly than anyone else, which sparked one hundred years of Netherlands naval, financial as well as artistic dominance across Europe and the globe.
The Original True Manufacturing Machine
Corneliszoon’s lumber mill, contends the writer, was “humanity’s first authentic factory machine.” A wind turbine turned a wheel. A single part transformed its circular motion to vertical motion to power the cutting blade. Another component transformed that same rotary motion into a lateral movement feeding the log toward the cutter. A geared mechanism shifted the log ahead one precise increment per stroke.
“Every component was simple on its own. Corneliszoon’s brilliance was to integrate these parts so the machine acted within a perfectly controlled sequence, cutting with each descending motion while advancing with each return stroke. This constituted a remarkably clever application of fundamental components.”
A fact that brings us to the current challenge. I’d like you to reimagine one of the basic ideas underpinning Corneliszoon’s machine.
Circular to Vertical
Design a mechanism that turns rotary movement to up-and-down action. Your available these items exclusively: A rotating disc. Two pegs. Two rods. A “guide”, that is a cylinder or housing through which a single the rods can slide perfectly. (Assume you can mount components on a base, so that the parts don’t fall down.)
The solution returns at 5pm UK featuring the answer.
In the interim, NO SPOILERS. Rather, feel free to suggest (less celebrated) candidates for the world’s most impactful creation.
