🔗 Share this article Are You Able to Solve It? The Overlooked Netherlands Creation Which Shaped the Modern Globe One can find numerous candidates for the designation as “planet’s greatest invention.” The circular axle. The movable type. The combustion motor. As per a recent publication, however, that title belongs to the automated timber mill conceived by Dutchman Corneliszoon van Uitgeest during 1593. “Before automated sawing, building a modest merchant vessel necessitated approximately 10 sawyers laboring over three months,” notes the author. “Using wind-powered lumber mills, an identical quantity of processed timber could be manufactured within seven days.” Thanks to their rapid mechanical saw, which converted logs to boards using almost no human effort, the Dutch were able to build vessels more quickly compared to anyone else, which sparked one hundred years of Netherlands maritime, economic as well as cultural supremacy across the continent and the globe. The First True Industrial Device Corneliszoon’s sawmill, argues the writer, was “mankind’s first authentic factory machine.” A wind turbine turned a wheel. A single part transformed its circular movement to up-and-down motion to power the saw. Another component transformed that same rotary motion into a lateral movement advancing the timber toward the cutter. A geared mechanism moved the log forward one precise increment each stroke. “Every component seemed simple on its own. Corneliszoon’s brilliance lay in how to integrate these parts in order that they operated within a perfectly controlled order, cutting on every descending stroke and advancing with each upward stroke. This constituted a remarkably clever application of basic components.” Which brings us to today’s challenge. The task is you to reinvent one of the basic ideas underpinning this historic machine. Circular to Vertical Design a machine that turns circular motion into up-and-down action. Your available these components exclusively: A spinning wheel. Two pegs. Two bars. A “guide”, that is a tube or sleeve into which a single the rods can slide perfectly. (Consider that you can mount components on a stand, so that the components do not fall down.) The solution returns at 5pm UK featuring the solution. Meanwhile, PLEASE NO HINTS. Instead, feel free to propose (non obvious) candidates for the planet’s most impactful creation.