Can You Solve This? That Forgotten Netherlands Invention Which Forged our Contemporary World
There are many candidates for the designation as “planet’s greatest invention.” The wheel. The printing press. The combustion motor.
As per a recent publication, however, that title belongs to the mechanised timber mill invented by Dutch inventor Corneliszoon van Uitgeest during 1593.
“Prior to mechanised sawing, building a modest merchant vessel necessitated approximately 10 sawyers working for 90 days,” writes the author. “Using wind-powered sawmills, an identical quantity of processed timber could be manufactured within a week.”
Thanks to their rapid automated cutter, that turned timber into planks using virtually no human effort, the Dutch were able to build vessels more quickly than any other nation, an advantage that unleashed a century of Dutch naval, financial as well as cultural dominance across the continent and the globe.
The Original True Industrial Device
Corneliszoon’s lumber mill, argues Dávila, represented “humanity’s initial authentic factory machine.” A wind turbine turned a gear. A single part transformed the circular motion into vertical motion for the saw. A separate mechanism transformed the rotary movement into a sideway’s movement advancing the log to the cutter. A geared mechanism moved the wood ahead one precise increment per stroke.
“Every component seemed simple by itself. The Dutchman’s genius lay in how to combine these parts so they acted within a precisely synchronized order, cutting on every downward motion and advancing on every return stroke. It was an astonishingly clever use of fundamental parts.”
A fact that brings us up to today’s puzzle. I’d like for you to reimagine one of the fundamental ideas underpinning Corneliszoon’s machine.
Round and Up
Construct a mechanism which converts circular movement into up-and-down motion. You have these components only: A spinning wheel. Two pegs. Two rods. A “sleeve”, which is a tube or sleeve through which one of the rods will fit snugly. (Assume it is possible to put things on a base, so that the components don’t fall down.)
I’ll be back later today UK time featuring the solution.
In the interim, PLEASE NO HINTS. Rather, feel free to suggest (non obvious) contenders as the planet’s most impactful creation.
