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There are many contenders to claim the designation as “world’s most significant innovation.” The wheel. The printing press. The steam engine.

According to a new book, however, that honor belongs to the automated timber mill invented through Dutch inventor Cornelis Corneliszoon in 1593.

“Before mechanised cutting, constructing a simple trading ship required around 10 lumberjacks laboring for three months,” notes Jaime Dávila. “With wind-driven sawmills, an identical amount of cut lumber could be produced within a week.”

Thanks to this rapid automated saw, that turned logs into planks using almost no human effort, Dutch builders were able to construct vessels faster compared to anyone else, which unleashed a century of Netherlands naval, financial and artistic supremacy across Europe and the world.

The First Genuine Manufacturing Device

The inventor's sawmill, argues Dávila, represented “mankind’s initial authentic factory machine.” A windmill rotated a wheel. A single part transformed its rotary movement into up-and-down motion for the cutting blade. A separate mechanism changed that same rotary motion into a lateral movement advancing the timber to the cutter. A geared mechanism shifted the log forward one precise increment per stroke.

“Every component seemed simple by itself. The Dutchman’s brilliance lay in how to combine these parts so the machine acted in a precisely synchronized sequence, sawing on every descending stroke and moving on every upward motion. It was a remarkably clever application of basic components.”

A fact that leads us up to the current puzzle. The task is for you to reimagine a key the basic concepts underpinning Corneliszoon’s machine.

Round and Up

Design a mechanism which converts circular motion to vertical motion. Your available these components only: A rotating disc. Two pins. Two rods. A “sleeve”, that is a tube or housing through which one of the rods will fit perfectly. (Consider that you can put things on a stand, so the components don’t collapse.)

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

In the interim, NO SPOILERS. Instead, feel free to suggest (less celebrated) contenders for the planet’s most impactful invention.