Can You Solve It? That Overlooked Netherlands Creation That Forged the Contemporary Globe
One can find many contenders for the title of “world’s most significant invention.” The wheel. The movable type. The steam engine.
According to a new book, however, that title should go to the automated sawmill conceived through Dutchman Cornelis Corneliszoon during 1593.
“Before mechanised cutting, constructing a modest trading ship required approximately ten lumberjacks working over 90 days,” writes Jaime Dávila. “With wind-driven sawmills, the same amount of cut lumber might be manufactured within seven days.”
Owing to this rapid mechanical saw, that converted logs into planks using virtually no manual labor, the Dutch could construct ships faster than any other nation, an advantage that unleashed a century of Dutch naval, economic as well as cultural dominance across the continent and the globe.
The Original Genuine Industrial Machine
The inventor's sawmill, contends the writer, represented “humanity’s first authentic industrial machine.” A windmill turned a gear. A single part transformed its circular motion into up-and-down action for the saw. A separate mechanism transformed the spinning movement into a sideway’s motion feeding the log toward the blade. A geared mechanism moved the wood ahead one precise increment each cycle.
“Every component was simple by itself. The Dutchman’s brilliance was to combine them so the machine operated in a precisely synchronized order, sawing on every downward motion and moving with each upward motion. This constituted an astonishingly intelligent use of basic parts.”
A fact that brings us up to the current puzzle. I’d like for you to reinvent a key the basic ideas underpinning this historic machine.
Round and Up
Design a mechanism which converts circular movement into up-and-down motion. Your available these items only: A spinning wheel. Two pegs. Two rods. A “sleeve”, which is a cylinder or housing into which one of the bars can slide perfectly. (Consider that you can mount components on a stand, so that the components do not fall down.)
I’ll be back later today UK featuring the solution.
Meanwhile, NO SPOILERS. Instead, feel free to propose (less celebrated) candidates as the planet’s most impactful creation.
