🔗 Share this article Are You Able to Solve It? That Forgotten Dutch Invention That Shaped our Contemporary Globe There are many contenders to claim the designation as “world’s most significant invention.” The circular axle. The movable type. The combustion motor. According to a recent publication, though, that title belongs to the mechanised sawmill invented through Dutch inventor Cornelis Corneliszoon during 1593. “Prior to automated cutting, constructing a simple trading ship necessitated around ten sawyers working over 90 days,” notes the author. “With wind-powered sawmills, the same amount of processed timber might be produced in less than seven days.” Thanks to their speedy mechanical cutter, which turned logs to boards using virtually no human effort, the Dutch were able to construct ships more quickly compared to anyone else, which unleashed one hundred years of Netherlands maritime, financial and cultural supremacy in the continent and the globe. The Original True Manufacturing Machine Corneliszoon’s sawmill, argues Dávila, represented “mankind’s first authentic industrial machine.” A wind turbine turned a gear. A single part transformed the rotary motion into vertical motion for the saw. Another component changed that same rotary movement into a lateral movement feeding the log to the blade. A geared mechanism shifted the wood forward a measured step per stroke. “Every component was simple by itself. Corneliszoon’s genius lay in how to integrate these parts so the machine operated within a perfectly controlled order, cutting with each descending stroke while moving with each upward stroke. It was an astonishingly intelligent use of fundamental parts.” A fact that leads us up to today’s challenge. The task is for you to reinvent one of the basic concepts underpinning Corneliszoon’s machine. Round and Up Construct a machine which converts circular motion to up-and-down motion. You have these items only: A spinning wheel. Two pegs. Two bars. A “guide”, that is a cylinder or housing through which a single the bars will fit perfectly. (Consider that you can mount components on a stand, so the parts don’t collapse.) I’ll be back later today UK with the answer. Meanwhile, PLEASE NO HINTS. Rather, please propose (less celebrated) contenders for the world’s greatest invention.