One can find many candidates to claim the title of “world’s most significant invention.” The wheel. The printing press. The combustion motor.
As per a recent publication, however, that honor belongs to the automated sawmill conceived by Dutchman Cornelis Corneliszoon during 1593.
“Prior to mechanised sawing, constructing a simple trading ship required around ten sawyers working over three months,” notes Jaime Dávila. “Using wind-powered sawmills, the same amount of cut lumber might be produced within seven days.”
Owing to their speedy mechanical saw, that converted timber to planks using almost no human effort, Dutch builders could construct ships more quickly than any other nation, an advantage that unleashed a century of Dutch maritime, economic and artistic supremacy in Europe and the world.
The First True Manufacturing Device
Corneliszoon’s lumber mill, contends Dávila, was “humanity’s first authentic factory machine.” A wind turbine rotated a gear. A single part converted its rotary motion into vertical action for the saw. Another component changed that same rotary motion into a sideway’s movement feeding the timber to the blade. A geared mechanism shifted the log ahead a measured step each cycle.
“Each element seemed simple on its own. The Dutchman’s brilliance lay in how to combine them in order that the machine operated in a perfectly controlled sequence, sawing on every downward motion and advancing with each upward motion. This constituted an astonishingly intelligent application of fundamental parts.”
A fact that brings us up to today’s challenge. I’d like for you to reimagine one of the fundamental concepts behind Corneliszoon’s invention.
Round and Up
Construct a mechanism that turns circular movement to up-and-down motion. You have these components exclusively: A rotating disc. Two pins. Two bars. A “sleeve”, which is a cylinder or sleeve through which one of the rods can slide perfectly. (Consider that it is possible to put things on a base, so that the parts do not collapse.)
I’ll be back later today UK featuring the answer.
Meanwhile, PLEASE NO HINTS. Rather, please suggest (less celebrated) candidates for the planet’s most impactful invention.
