Are You Able to Crack It? The Overlooked Dutch Creation That Forged the Contemporary Globe

One can find numerous contenders for the title of “planet’s most significant invention.” The wheel. The printing press. The steam engine.

As per a recent publication, though, that title belongs to the automated sawmill invented by Dutch inventor Corneliszoon van Uitgeest during 1593.

“Prior to automated sawing, constructing a modest trading ship required approximately ten lumberjacks laboring for three months,” writes the author. “Using wind-driven sawmills, an identical amount of cut lumber might be manufactured within seven days.”

Thanks to their rapid automated cutter, which converted timber into boards using virtually no human effort, Dutch builders could construct ships more quickly than any other nation, an advantage that unleashed a century of Netherlands naval, financial as well as artistic dominance in Europe and the globe.

The Original True Manufacturing Machine

The inventor's sawmill, argues the writer, was “humanity’s first true industrial machine.” A windmill rotated a gear. One component converted the rotary movement to vertical motion to power the saw. Another component transformed that same rotary motion into a sideway’s motion advancing the timber toward the cutter. A geared mechanism shifted the wood forward a measured step per cycle.

“Each element seemed modest by itself. Corneliszoon’s genius lay in how to combine them so the machine acted in a perfectly controlled order, cutting on every descending stroke and moving on every return stroke. This constituted a remarkably intelligent use of fundamental components.”

Which leads us to today’s puzzle. I’d like you to reimagine one of the basic ideas underpinning this historic invention.

Circular to Vertical

Construct a machine which converts circular motion to vertical motion. Your available these items only: A spinning wheel. Two pins. Two bars. A “sleeve”, which is a tube or sleeve through which one of the bars will fit snugly. (Consider that it is possible to put things on a base, so the components don’t collapse.)

I’ll be back at 5pm UK with the answer.

Meanwhile, NO SPOILERS. Rather, feel free to suggest (non obvious) candidates for the world’s greatest invention.