Can You Crack It? That Overlooked Dutch Creation That Shaped our Modern Globe
One can find numerous candidates for the designation as “world’s greatest invention.” The wheel. The printing press. The combustion motor.
As per a new book, though, that honor should go to the automated timber mill invented through Dutch inventor Cornelis Corneliszoon in 1593.
“Before automated cutting, building a modest trading ship required around ten sawyers laboring over three months,” writes Jaime Dávila. “With wind-powered lumber mills, the same amount of processed timber might be manufactured in less than a week.”
Owing to their rapid automated cutter, which converted logs into planks using almost no human effort, Dutch builders were able to construct vessels faster than anyone else, an advantage that sparked one hundred years of Netherlands naval, economic and cultural dominance in the continent and the globe.
The First True Industrial Machine
Corneliszoon’s lumber mill, argues the writer, represented “humanity’s first authentic factory apparatus.” A wind turbine rotated a wheel. A single part transformed the rotary motion into up-and-down motion to power the saw. A separate mechanism transformed the rotary movement into a sideway’s motion feeding the log to the blade. A geared mechanism moved the log ahead one precise increment each cycle.
“Each element seemed modest by itself. The Dutchman’s genius lay in how to integrate them in order that they operated in a precisely synchronized order, sawing with each descending motion while moving with each return motion. This constituted a remarkably intelligent application of basic parts.”
A fact that brings us to the current challenge. The task is you to reinvent one of the fundamental ideas behind this historic invention.
Circular to Vertical
Construct a machine that turns rotary movement to vertical motion. You have these items only: A rotating disc. Two pins. Two rods. A “sleeve”, that is a cylinder or housing into which one of the rods will fit perfectly. (Consider that it is possible to put things on a stand, so the components don’t collapse.)
The solution returns at 5pm UK with the solution.
In the interim, PLEASE NO HINTS. Rather, please suggest (less celebrated) contenders for the planet’s most impactful invention.
