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There are many contenders to claim the designation as “planet’s most significant innovation.” The circular axle. The movable type. The steam engine.

According to a recent publication, though, that honor should go to the automated sawmill invented through Dutchman Corneliszoon van Uitgeest in 1593.

“Before mechanised cutting, constructing a simple merchant vessel required around ten sawyers laboring for 90 days,” notes Jaime Dávila. “Using wind-powered lumber mills, the same quantity of processed timber might be produced within seven days.”

Thanks to this speedy automated saw, that turned logs into boards with virtually no manual labor, the Dutch were able to build vessels faster than any other nation, which sparked one hundred years of Netherlands naval, economic and cultural supremacy across Europe and the world.

The First True Manufacturing Machine

Corneliszoon’s lumber mill, argues the writer, represented “humanity’s first true factory apparatus.” A wind turbine turned a wheel. A single part transformed the circular movement to vertical motion to power the cutting blade. A separate mechanism transformed the spinning movement into a sideway’s motion feeding the log to the blade. A geared mechanism moved the wood ahead a measured step each cycle.

“Each element was modest by itself. Corneliszoon’s brilliance lay in how to integrate these parts so the machine acted in a precisely synchronized order, sawing on every descending stroke and moving on every upward motion. It was an astonishingly intelligent use of fundamental parts.”

Which leads us up to the current challenge. The task is you to reinvent one of the basic ideas underpinning this historic invention.

Circular to Vertical

Design a machine which converts circular motion to up-and-down action. You have these items exclusively: A spinning wheel. Two pegs. Two rods. A “guide”, which is a tube or housing into which a single the bars will fit snugly. (Assume it is possible to put things on a stand, so the parts do not fall down.)

The solution returns at 5pm UK time with the solution.

In the interim, PLEASE NO HINTS. Instead, feel free to propose (less celebrated) contenders for the world’s greatest creation.