Are You Able to Crack It? That Overlooked Netherlands Invention That Shaped our Contemporary World
One can find numerous candidates for the title of “world’s greatest invention.” The wheel. The printing press. The combustion motor.
As per a new book, however, that honor should go to the automated sawmill invented by Dutch inventor Cornelis Corneliszoon in 1593.
“Prior to automated cutting, building a simple trading ship required around 10 sawyers laboring for three months,” notes the author. “Using wind-driven sawmills, the same amount of cut lumber could be manufactured in less than a week.”
Owing to their speedy automated saw, that converted logs into boards with almost no human effort, Dutch builders could build ships faster compared to anyone else, which sparked a century of Netherlands maritime, financial and cultural supremacy across Europe and the globe.
The Original True Manufacturing Machine
Corneliszoon’s sawmill, argues the writer, represented “mankind’s initial authentic industrial apparatus.” A wind turbine turned a wheel. A single part transformed its rotary motion to vertical motion for the saw. A separate mechanism transformed that same rotary movement into a sideway’s movement advancing the log toward the cutter. A geared mechanism moved the wood ahead a measured step each cycle.
“Each element was modest by itself. The Dutchman’s brilliance was to integrate them in order that the machine operated within a perfectly controlled order, cutting on every downward stroke and moving with each upward motion. It was an astonishingly intelligent use of fundamental parts.”
A fact that leads us to the current puzzle. The task is you to reimagine one of the fundamental ideas behind this historic machine.
Circular to Vertical
Construct a mechanism which converts rotary motion into vertical motion. Your available these components only: A rotating disc. Two pegs. Two rods. A “sleeve”, which is a tube or housing into which a single the bars can slide snugly. (Assume it is possible to mount components on a stand, so that the components do not collapse.)
I’ll be back later today UK time featuring the answer.
In the interim, PLEASE NO HINTS. Instead, feel free to propose (less celebrated) candidates as the planet’s greatest creation.
