🔗 Share this article Are You Able to Solve This? The Forgotten Netherlands Invention Which Forged our Modern Globe There are many candidates for the designation as “planet’s greatest innovation.” The circular axle. The printing press. The combustion motor. According to a new book, though, that honor belongs to the automated timber mill invented by Dutch inventor Cornelis Corneliszoon during 1593. “Prior to automated cutting, building a modest merchant vessel required approximately ten lumberjacks working for 90 days,” notes the author. “Using wind-powered sawmills, the same amount of processed timber might be manufactured in less than a week.” Thanks to this rapid mechanical saw, which turned logs to boards using virtually no human effort, the Dutch were able to build ships faster compared to anyone else, an advantage that unleashed one hundred years of Dutch maritime, economic as well as cultural supremacy in Europe and the world. The Original Genuine Industrial Machine The inventor's lumber mill, argues Dávila, was “mankind’s initial true factory machine.” A wind turbine turned a gear. One component converted its rotary motion to vertical motion for the saw. A separate mechanism changed the spinning motion into a sideway’s motion feeding the log toward the cutter. A geared mechanism shifted the wood forward one precise increment each cycle. “Each element was simple by itself. The Dutchman’s brilliance lay in how to combine them so they acted within a perfectly controlled order, sawing on every downward stroke while advancing on every upward motion. This constituted an astonishingly intelligent application of fundamental parts.” Which leads us to today’s puzzle. I’d like for you to reimagine a key the basic concepts behind Corneliszoon’s invention. Round and Up Construct a machine that turns circular motion to vertical action. Your available these components only: A rotating disc. Two pins. Two bars. A “guide”, which is a tube or sleeve into which one of the rods can slide snugly. (Assume you can mount components on a base, so the parts do not fall down.) The solution returns later today UK with the answer. Meanwhile, PLEASE NO HINTS. Rather, please propose (non obvious) contenders for the world’s most impactful invention.