Are You Able to Crack It? That Overlooked Dutch Creation Which Forged the Contemporary Globe
One can find numerous candidates for the title of “planet’s greatest invention.” The circular axle. The printing press. The steam engine.
According to a new book, however, that honor should go to the mechanised sawmill invented through Dutch inventor Cornelis Corneliszoon in 1593.
“Before automated sawing, building a simple trading ship necessitated around ten sawyers laboring for 90 days,” notes the author. “With wind-driven sawmills, the same amount of processed timber could be manufactured in less than a week.”
Owing to this speedy automated cutter, that converted logs to boards using almost no human effort, the Dutch could construct vessels more quickly compared to any other nation, an advantage that unleashed a century of Netherlands maritime, economic and artistic dominance across Europe and the world.
The Original True Industrial Device
Corneliszoon’s sawmill, argues the writer, represented “mankind’s initial true industrial machine.” A windmill rotated a gear. A single part transformed the rotary motion into up-and-down motion for the saw. A separate mechanism changed that same spinning motion into a lateral motion advancing the timber to the blade. A ratchet system moved the log ahead one precise increment each cycle.
“Each element seemed simple on its own. Corneliszoon’s brilliance was to integrate these parts in order that they operated within a perfectly controlled order, sawing on every downward motion and moving with each upward stroke. It was an astonishingly clever use of fundamental parts.”
Which leads us to the current puzzle. I’d like for you to reimagine one of the fundamental ideas underpinning Corneliszoon’s invention.
Circular to Vertical
Design a mechanism which converts circular motion into vertical action. Your available these items exclusively: A rotating disc. Two pins. Two rods. A “guide”, which is a tube or sleeve into which one of the rods can slide snugly. (Consider that you can put things on a stand, so the components do not fall down.)
I’ll be back later today UK time with the solution.
Meanwhile, NO SPOILERS. Rather, feel free to suggest (non obvious) candidates as the planet’s greatest invention.
