🔗 Share this article Are You Able to Crack This? The Overlooked Dutch Creation Which Forged our Modern Globe One can find numerous candidates to claim the title of “world’s most significant innovation.” The wheel. The printing press. The steam engine. As per a recent publication, however, that honor belongs to the mechanised timber mill invented by Dutch inventor Cornelis Corneliszoon during 1593. “Before mechanised cutting, constructing a simple trading ship required approximately 10 sawyers laboring for 90 days,” notes Jaime Dávila. “Using wind-powered lumber mills, an identical quantity of processed timber could be produced within seven days.” Owing to this rapid mechanical saw, which turned logs into planks using virtually no manual labor, the Dutch were able to build ships more quickly compared to anyone else, an advantage that unleashed a century of Netherlands naval, financial and artistic dominance in the continent and the world. The First Genuine Manufacturing Device The inventor's lumber mill, argues the writer, was “mankind’s first true factory apparatus.” A wind turbine turned a gear. One component transformed its rotary motion into up-and-down motion to power the cutting blade. A separate mechanism transformed that same rotary movement into a lateral movement advancing the timber to the blade. A ratchet system shifted the log ahead one precise increment each stroke. “Every component seemed simple on its own. Corneliszoon’s genius was to combine these parts so the machine operated within a precisely synchronized order, cutting with each descending stroke and advancing with each return stroke. It was an astonishingly clever use of fundamental components.” Which leads us to the current challenge. The task is you to reimagine one of the basic concepts behind Corneliszoon’s machine. Round and Up Design a mechanism which converts rotary motion into up-and-down action. Your available these items exclusively: A spinning wheel. Two pins. Two rods. A “guide”, that is a cylinder or sleeve into which a single the rods can slide snugly. (Consider that it is possible to put things on a base, so the components do not fall down.) The solution returns at 5pm UK with the solution. Meanwhile, PLEASE NO HINTS. Rather, feel free to propose (non obvious) contenders as the planet’s most impactful creation.