Are You Able to Crack It? The Forgotten Netherlands Invention Which Forged the Modern World
One can find many candidates to claim the title of “world’s greatest innovation.” The circular axle. The printing press. The combustion motor.
As per a new book, however, that title should go to the automated timber mill invented by Dutch inventor Corneliszoon van Uitgeest during 1593.
“Prior to automated sawing, building a modest trading ship required approximately 10 sawyers laboring over 90 days,” writes Jaime Dávila. “With wind-driven sawmills, the same amount of processed timber could be manufactured within seven days.”
Owing to their speedy mechanical cutter, which turned timber to planks with virtually no human effort, Dutch builders could build ships more quickly compared to any other nation, an advantage that unleashed a century of Netherlands naval, financial as well as cultural dominance across the continent and the world.
The Original Genuine Manufacturing Device
The inventor's lumber mill, contends the writer, was “mankind’s initial authentic industrial apparatus.” A wind turbine turned a gear. A single part transformed its rotary movement into up-and-down motion to power the cutting blade. A separate mechanism changed that same rotary motion into a sideway’s movement feeding the log to the cutter. A geared mechanism moved the log forward a measured step per stroke.
“Each element seemed modest on its own. The Dutchman’s brilliance was to combine these parts so the machine operated within a perfectly controlled sequence, cutting on every descending motion and moving with each return motion. It was an astonishingly intelligent application of fundamental components.”
A fact that brings us up to today’s challenge. The task is you to reinvent a key the basic ideas underpinning Corneliszoon’s machine.
Circular to Vertical
Design a machine that turns rotary motion to up-and-down action. Your available these items only: A rotating disc. Two pins. Two rods. A “guide”, that is a tube or housing through which a single the rods can slide perfectly. (Assume it is possible to put things on a stand, so that the parts do not fall down.)
I’ll be back at 5pm UK time with the solution.
In the interim, PLEASE NO HINTS. Rather, feel free to propose (non obvious) candidates as the world’s greatest creation.
