Can You Solve It? That Forgotten Dutch Invention Which Forged the Modern Globe
One can find many contenders for the title of “planet’s most significant invention.” The wheel. The movable type. The steam engine.
As per a recent publication, though, that honor belongs to a automated timber mill conceived through Dutch inventor Corneliszoon van Uitgeest in 1593.
“Before automated cutting, building a modest trading ship necessitated around 10 sawyers laboring for 90 days,” notes the author. “Using wind-powered sawmills, an identical amount of cut lumber could be produced in less than seven days.”
Thanks to their rapid mechanical cutter, which converted timber to boards using almost no human effort, the Dutch were able to build ships more quickly than any other nation, an advantage that sparked one hundred years of Netherlands naval, economic as well as cultural dominance in the continent and the globe.
The Original True Industrial Machine
Corneliszoon’s sawmill, argues Dávila, was “mankind’s first authentic industrial apparatus.” A windmill rotated a gear. A single part converted the circular movement into up-and-down action to power the saw. Another component changed the rotary motion into a sideway’s motion feeding the timber to the cutter. A geared mechanism moved the wood ahead one precise increment per stroke.
“Every component seemed modest on its own. Corneliszoon’s brilliance was to integrate them so the machine operated within a perfectly controlled sequence, sawing with each descending stroke and advancing on every upward stroke. This constituted an astonishingly intelligent use of basic components.”
Which leads us up to the current puzzle. I’d like for you to reimagine one of the fundamental concepts underpinning this historic machine.
Round and Up
Design a machine which converts circular motion into up-and-down motion. Your available these items only: A rotating disc. Two pegs. Two rods. A “sleeve”, that is a tube or sleeve into which one of the bars can slide snugly. (Assume it is possible to mount components on a base, so the parts do not fall down.)
The solution returns at 5pm UK time featuring the answer.
Meanwhile, NO SPOILERS. Instead, feel free to suggest (non obvious) candidates for the world’s greatest creation.