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One can find numerous contenders to claim the designation as “planet’s most significant innovation.” The circular axle. The movable type. The combustion motor.

As per a new book, though, that honor should go to a automated timber mill conceived through Dutchman Corneliszoon van Uitgeest during 1593.

“Prior to mechanised sawing, building a simple trading ship necessitated approximately 10 sawyers working over 90 days,” writes Jaime Dávila. “Using wind-powered lumber mills, the same quantity of processed timber might be produced within seven days.”

Owing to their rapid automated saw, that turned logs into planks using almost no human effort, Dutch builders could construct vessels faster compared to any other nation, which sparked a century of Dutch naval, economic as well as cultural dominance across Europe and the globe.

The First Genuine Manufacturing Device

Corneliszoon’s lumber mill, argues the writer, was “humanity’s initial true industrial machine.” A wind turbine rotated a wheel. A single part transformed its rotary movement to vertical motion to power the saw. Another component changed the rotary movement into a sideway’s movement feeding the log to the cutter. A ratchet system shifted the log ahead a measured step each cycle.

“Every component seemed modest by itself. The Dutchman’s brilliance lay in how to combine them in order that they acted within a perfectly controlled sequence, cutting on every downward motion while moving on every upward stroke. This constituted a remarkably clever use 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 machine that turns rotary motion into up-and-down motion. Your available these components only: A spinning wheel. Two pegs. Two bars. A “guide”, that is a tube or housing into which a single the bars can slide snugly. (Consider that you can put things on a stand, so that the components do not collapse.)

I’ll be back later today UK featuring the solution.

In the interim, PLEASE NO HINTS. Instead, please suggest (non obvious) candidates for the planet’s greatest creation.