Can You Crack This? That Overlooked Netherlands Creation Which Forged our Modern Globe
One can find many contenders to claim the title of “planet’s greatest innovation.” The circular axle. The printing press. The steam engine.
According to a recent publication, however, that title should go to a automated timber mill invented through Dutchman Cornelis Corneliszoon during 1593.
“Before automated cutting, constructing a modest trading ship necessitated approximately 10 lumberjacks laboring over three months,” notes the author. “With wind-driven lumber mills, the same quantity of processed timber might be produced within a week.”
Owing to their rapid automated cutter, which converted logs to planks using virtually no manual labor, Dutch builders could construct ships more quickly than any other nation, which sparked a century of Dutch maritime, economic as well as artistic dominance across the continent and the world.
The First True Manufacturing Machine
Corneliszoon’s lumber mill, contends the writer, represented “humanity’s initial true industrial machine.” A windmill turned a wheel. A single part transformed the circular motion to up-and-down action for the saw. A separate mechanism changed that same spinning movement into a lateral movement feeding the timber toward the cutter. A geared mechanism moved the wood ahead a measured step each stroke.
“Each element was modest on its own. The Dutchman’s brilliance was to integrate these parts so they acted within a precisely synchronized order, sawing on every descending stroke while moving on every return motion. This constituted an astonishingly clever use of fundamental parts.”
A fact that brings us up to the current puzzle. The task is for you to reimagine a key the fundamental ideas underpinning Corneliszoon’s machine.
Circular to Vertical
Design a machine which converts circular motion to up-and-down motion. You have these components only: A spinning wheel. Two pegs. Two bars. A “sleeve”, which is a cylinder or housing through which a single the bars can slide snugly. (Assume it is possible to mount components on a base, so that the components do not fall down.)
I’ll be back at 5pm UK time featuring the answer.
In the interim, PLEASE NO HINTS. Instead, feel free to propose (less celebrated) contenders for the planet’s greatest creation.
