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One can find many contenders for the designation as “planet’s most significant innovation.” The wheel. The printing press. The combustion motor.

According to a new book, however, that title belongs to the automated sawmill conceived through Dutch inventor Corneliszoon van Uitgeest in 1593.

“Before mechanised sawing, building a simple merchant vessel necessitated approximately ten sawyers working for 90 days,” writes Jaime Dávila. “With wind-powered sawmills, the same quantity of cut lumber could be produced in less than seven days.”

Thanks to their speedy mechanical saw, that turned timber to boards with virtually no manual labor, the Dutch were able to build vessels faster compared to any other nation, an advantage that sparked one hundred years of Dutch maritime, economic and artistic dominance in the continent and the world.

The First True Manufacturing Device

Corneliszoon’s lumber mill, contends Dávila, was “humanity’s initial authentic industrial apparatus.” A windmill rotated a gear. One component transformed the circular movement to vertical action to power the cutting blade. Another component transformed the spinning movement into a sideway’s motion advancing the timber to the blade. A geared mechanism moved the wood ahead a measured step per stroke.

“Every component was modest by itself. The Dutchman’s brilliance was to combine these parts in order that the machine operated in a perfectly controlled order, sawing on every descending motion while advancing with each return stroke. This constituted an astonishingly intelligent use of fundamental parts.”

Which leads us to the current challenge. The task is for you to reinvent one of the fundamental concepts behind this historic machine.

Round and Up

Construct a mechanism that turns rotary movement into up-and-down motion. You have these items only: A spinning wheel. Two pegs. Two bars. A “sleeve”, that is a cylinder or housing through which a single the bars will fit perfectly. (Assume it is possible to put things on a stand, so the components do not collapse.)

The solution returns later today UK featuring the solution.

Meanwhile, NO SPOILERS. Instead, please suggest (less celebrated) candidates for the world’s greatest creation.