Can You Solve It? The Forgotten Netherlands Invention Which Shaped the Contemporary World
There are numerous contenders to claim the designation as “planet’s most significant invention.” The circular axle. The printing press. The steam engine.
As per a new book, though, that title belongs to a automated timber mill conceived by Dutchman Corneliszoon van Uitgeest in 1593.
“Before automated cutting, constructing a simple trading ship required approximately 10 sawyers laboring for 90 days,” writes Jaime Dávila. “Using wind-driven sawmills, the same amount of processed timber might be produced within a week.”
Thanks to their speedy mechanical cutter, which turned timber to boards using almost no manual labor, Dutch builders could construct ships more quickly compared to any other nation, an advantage that sparked a century of Netherlands maritime, financial and artistic supremacy across Europe and the world.
The Original Genuine Manufacturing Device
The inventor's sawmill, contends the writer, was “mankind’s initial authentic factory apparatus.” A wind turbine rotated a wheel. A single part transformed its rotary motion into up-and-down motion to power the saw. Another component changed that same rotary motion into a lateral movement feeding the timber to the blade. A geared mechanism moved the wood ahead a measured step each cycle.
“Every component was simple by itself. The Dutchman’s brilliance lay in how to integrate them so the machine acted within a perfectly controlled sequence, cutting on every descending stroke and moving on every upward stroke. This constituted a remarkably clever use of fundamental components.”
A fact that brings us up to today’s challenge. The task is for you to reinvent a key the basic concepts behind Corneliszoon’s invention.
Circular to Vertical
Construct a machine which converts circular movement to up-and-down motion. Your available these items exclusively: A spinning wheel. Two pegs. Two rods. A “guide”, that is a tube or housing through which one of the rods can slide snugly. (Consider that you can mount components on a stand, so the parts don’t collapse.)
The solution returns later today UK time featuring the solution.
In the interim, PLEASE NO HINTS. Instead, please propose (less celebrated) contenders for the planet’s greatest invention.
