Can You Crack This? That Overlooked Netherlands Invention Which Forged the Contemporary Globe
There are many candidates for the title of “planet’s greatest invention.” The wheel. The printing press. The steam engine.
According to a recent publication, however, that title should go to a automated sawmill invented by Dutch inventor Corneliszoon van Uitgeest in 1593.
“Prior to automated sawing, constructing a simple trading ship necessitated approximately ten sawyers working for 90 days,” notes the author. “With wind-powered sawmills, an identical amount of processed timber could be produced within a week.”
Thanks to this speedy mechanical saw, which turned logs to planks using almost no human effort, Dutch builders could construct ships faster compared to any other nation, an advantage that unleashed one hundred years of Netherlands naval, financial and cultural dominance across Europe and the globe.
The First Genuine Manufacturing Machine
The inventor's lumber mill, contends Dávila, was “mankind’s initial authentic factory machine.” A wind turbine rotated a gear. One component transformed its rotary movement into up-and-down motion to power the saw. Another component transformed that same rotary motion into a lateral motion feeding the log toward the cutter. A ratchet system shifted the wood ahead a measured step each stroke.
“Each element seemed simple on its own. Corneliszoon’s brilliance lay in how to combine these parts in order that the machine operated in a precisely synchronized order, cutting with each descending motion while advancing with each return motion. This constituted a remarkably clever application of fundamental parts.”
A fact that leads us to today’s challenge. I’d like you to reimagine one of the fundamental ideas behind Corneliszoon’s machine.
Round and Up
Design a machine which converts rotary motion into vertical motion. Your available these items exclusively: A spinning wheel. Two pins. Two rods. A “guide”, that is a tube or housing into which a single the rods can slide perfectly. (Assume you can mount components on a base, so the components don’t collapse.)
I’ll be back later today UK time with the solution.
In the interim, PLEASE NO HINTS. Rather, please propose (less celebrated) candidates for the planet’s greatest invention.