Are You Able to Crack It? The Forgotten Netherlands Creation That Shaped the Modern World
One can find numerous contenders for the designation as “world’s greatest innovation.” The circular axle. The printing press. The combustion motor.
According to a recent publication, though, that honor belongs to the automated timber mill invented by Dutchman Cornelis Corneliszoon during 1593.
“Prior to mechanised cutting, constructing a modest merchant vessel required approximately 10 lumberjacks working over 90 days,” notes the author. “Using wind-driven lumber mills, the same amount of cut lumber might be produced in less than seven days.”
Owing to their rapid automated saw, that converted logs into boards with almost no human effort, the Dutch were able to build vessels more quickly than anyone else, an advantage that unleashed a century of Dutch naval, financial as well as cultural dominance across the continent and the globe.
The First True Manufacturing Machine
The inventor's lumber mill, argues Dávila, represented “mankind’s initial true industrial apparatus.” A windmill turned a wheel. A single part transformed the rotary movement to up-and-down action to power the saw. A separate mechanism changed the rotary motion into a lateral movement advancing the timber toward the cutter. A ratchet system moved the wood ahead one precise increment each cycle.
“Each element seemed simple on its own. The Dutchman’s genius lay in how to combine these parts so the machine acted within a precisely synchronized sequence, sawing with each downward motion and moving with each upward stroke. It was a remarkably intelligent application of basic components.”
A fact that leads us to the current challenge. I’d like you to reinvent one of the basic concepts underpinning Corneliszoon’s machine.
Circular to Vertical
Design a mechanism which converts rotary movement to up-and-down action. Your available these items exclusively: A spinning wheel. Two pegs. Two bars. A “sleeve”, that is a cylinder or sleeve through which one of the bars can slide perfectly. (Consider that it is possible to put things on a stand, so that the parts do not collapse.)
I’ll be back at 5pm UK with the answer.
In the interim, PLEASE NO HINTS. Instead, feel free to propose (non obvious) contenders as the world’s greatest creation.
