Are You Able to Crack It? That Forgotten Dutch Invention Which Shaped our Modern World
One can find many candidates to claim the designation as “planet’s most significant invention.” The circular axle. The printing press. The combustion motor.
As per a recent publication, however, that honor should go to the mechanised timber mill invented by Dutch inventor Corneliszoon van Uitgeest during 1593.
“Before mechanised cutting, constructing a simple merchant vessel necessitated around ten lumberjacks working over 90 days,” writes Jaime Dávila. “Using wind-powered lumber mills, an identical quantity of processed timber could be manufactured in less than a week.”
Owing to this speedy mechanical saw, that turned logs to planks using virtually no human effort, the Dutch could construct vessels faster compared to any other nation, an advantage that unleashed a century of Dutch maritime, economic and cultural dominance across Europe and the world.
The First Genuine Industrial Machine
Corneliszoon’s sawmill, argues the writer, represented “humanity’s initial true factory machine.” A wind turbine rotated a wheel. One component transformed its rotary movement into vertical action to power the saw. A separate mechanism changed that same rotary movement into a sideway’s motion feeding the log to the blade. A geared mechanism shifted the wood forward a measured step per stroke.
“Each element was modest by itself. The Dutchman’s genius lay in how to integrate them so the machine operated in a precisely synchronized order, sawing with each descending stroke while moving with each return motion. It was a remarkably clever application of basic parts.”
Which brings us up to the current challenge. The task is for you to reimagine one of the fundamental ideas behind Corneliszoon’s machine.
Circular to Vertical
Construct a machine which converts circular movement to vertical motion. Your available these components only: A spinning wheel. Two pegs. Two rods. A “sleeve”, that is a tube or housing through which one of the rods can slide perfectly. (Consider that you can put things on a stand, so that the components do not collapse.)
I’ll be back at 5pm UK with the answer.
In the interim, PLEASE NO HINTS. Rather, feel free to suggest (non obvious) contenders as the planet’s most impactful creation.
