🔗 Share this article Can You Crack It? The Forgotten Netherlands Creation Which Forged our Modern Globe One can find numerous contenders to claim the designation as “planet’s greatest invention.” The circular axle. The printing press. The combustion motor. As per a new book, though, that honor belongs to a mechanised sawmill invented through Dutchman Cornelis Corneliszoon in 1593. “Before mechanised sawing, constructing a modest trading ship necessitated around ten sawyers laboring for 90 days,” writes the author. “With wind-powered lumber mills, the same amount of cut lumber could be manufactured in less than seven days.” Owing to this rapid automated saw, that converted timber to boards with virtually no human effort, Dutch builders were able to build ships more quickly compared to anyone else, which unleashed one hundred years of Dutch naval, economic and artistic supremacy across Europe and the world. The First True Manufacturing Device The inventor's sawmill, contends Dávila, represented “humanity’s first true industrial machine.” A wind turbine turned a gear. A single part converted the circular movement into up-and-down action for the cutting blade. Another component transformed the spinning motion into a lateral movement feeding the log to the blade. A ratchet system shifted the wood ahead one precise increment per stroke. “Each element seemed modest by itself. Corneliszoon’s brilliance was to integrate them in order that the machine operated in a precisely synchronized order, sawing with each descending motion and advancing with each return motion. It was a remarkably intelligent application of basic parts.” A fact that leads us up to the current puzzle. The task is you to reimagine one of the fundamental concepts behind this historic invention. Round and Up Construct a mechanism which converts rotary motion to up-and-down motion. Your available these components only: A spinning wheel. Two pins. Two bars. A “sleeve”, which is a tube or housing into which one of the bars can slide snugly. (Consider that it is possible to mount components on a stand, so the components do not fall down.) I’ll be back later today UK time with the solution. In the interim, PLEASE NO HINTS. Instead, please suggest (less celebrated) candidates as the world’s greatest creation.