🔗 Share this article Are You Able to Solve This? That Overlooked Dutch Creation That Forged the Contemporary World There are numerous candidates to claim the title of “planet’s most significant invention.” The wheel. The movable type. The steam engine. As per a recent publication, however, that honor should go to a mechanised sawmill invented by Dutchman Cornelis Corneliszoon in 1593. “Prior to automated cutting, constructing a simple merchant vessel required around ten sawyers working for 90 days,” writes the author. “Using wind-driven sawmills, an identical quantity of cut lumber could be produced in less than a week.” Owing to this rapid mechanical saw, that converted timber to boards using virtually no human effort, the Dutch were able to construct vessels more quickly compared to anyone else, an advantage that sparked one hundred years of Netherlands naval, economic and artistic dominance in Europe and the globe. The Original True Manufacturing Device Corneliszoon’s sawmill, argues the writer, was “humanity’s initial true factory machine.” A wind turbine turned a wheel. A single part converted its circular movement into up-and-down motion for the saw. A separate mechanism changed that same rotary motion into a lateral motion advancing the timber toward the blade. A geared mechanism moved the wood ahead a measured step each stroke. “Every component was simple by itself. The Dutchman’s genius was to combine them in order that the machine acted within a perfectly controlled order, sawing with each descending motion while advancing with each return stroke. This constituted a remarkably intelligent application of fundamental components.” A fact that brings us up to the current puzzle. The task is for you to reinvent one of the basic concepts underpinning Corneliszoon’s machine. Circular to Vertical Design a machine that turns rotary motion to up-and-down action. You have these items exclusively: A rotating disc. Two pegs. Two bars. A “guide”, that is a tube or sleeve through which one of the bars will fit perfectly. (Assume it is possible to put things on a stand, so that the components do not collapse.) The solution returns at 5pm UK featuring the answer. Meanwhile, PLEASE NO HINTS. Rather, please suggest (non obvious) candidates for the world’s greatest invention.