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One can find numerous contenders to claim the designation as “world’s most significant innovation.” The wheel. The movable type. The steam engine.

As per a recent publication, though, that honor belongs to the mechanised timber mill conceived by Dutchman Corneliszoon van Uitgeest in 1593.

“Before mechanised sawing, constructing a simple trading ship necessitated around ten sawyers working for 90 days,” notes Jaime Dávila. “With wind-powered lumber mills, an identical quantity of processed timber could be manufactured in less than a week.”

Thanks to their speedy mechanical saw, that converted logs into planks using almost no human effort, Dutch builders could build ships more quickly than anyone else, which sparked a century of Netherlands naval, financial and artistic dominance across the continent and the globe.

The Original Genuine Industrial Device

The inventor's sawmill, contends Dávila, was “humanity’s initial authentic factory apparatus.” A windmill rotated a gear. A single part transformed its circular movement to vertical action to power the cutting blade. Another component changed the rotary movement into a sideway’s motion advancing the timber to the blade. A geared mechanism shifted the wood forward a measured step per cycle.

“Every component seemed simple on its own. Corneliszoon’s brilliance was to combine them so they operated in a perfectly controlled order, sawing with each downward motion and moving on every return stroke. This constituted a remarkably clever application of fundamental parts.”

Which brings us to the current challenge. I’d like you to reimagine a key the fundamental concepts underpinning this historic machine.

Circular to Vertical

Design a machine that turns rotary movement into up-and-down action. Your available these components exclusively: A spinning wheel. Two pegs. Two bars. A “guide”, that is a tube or sleeve into which one of the rods will fit snugly. (Consider that you can mount components on a base, so that the parts don’t collapse.)

I’ll be back at 5pm UK featuring the answer.

Meanwhile, NO SPOILERS. Instead, please propose (non obvious) candidates as the world’s most impactful creation.