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Jack: Since the lifting
of weights is one ofthe most common problems of the engineer and
mechanic, Leonardo gave it much study, designing devices using
the principle ofthe pulley, the screw, and, as here, the ratchet
in a form that anticipates the modern automobile jack. |
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File Cutter: Though there
is no record that such a machine was built, it is workable in
principle. It involves two ideas significant for the future: first,
the use of a threaded shaft to control automatically the movement
of the file blank so that it may be evenly scored by the trip-hammer,
and second, the use of a falling weight as a source of power.
The latter is a clockwork mechanism here applied to an industrial
use. Therefore the machine represents a step toward automation,
an idea that recurs in Leonardo's notebooks, but was not to be
realized for centuries. |
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Spring-Driven Car: It
is doubtful that any such vehicle was ever constructed. Though
springs had been known since ancient times, their use to supply
power first appeared in clocks and watches made after Leonardo's
time. He recognized their potential usefulness in such theoretical
designs as this, and in a drawing for a flying machine in which
springs were intended to provide an aid to manpower. |
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Automatic Turnspit: Such
devices were known in various automatic and semiautomatic forms
since ancient times. In this version Leonardo shows his knowledge
of the principle of convection, since the spit turns through the
action of the rising hot air on the fan set in the chimney flue.
In another turnspit he applied the clockwork mechanism of the
falling weight to turn the spit, using a fan vaned with goose
feathers as a governor. |
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Roller Bearings: Leonardo
carried out many experiments with friction, including a transmission
system. He found that roller bearings, as here applied to the
revolving axle of a wagon, were excellent "friction removers,"
a function they continue to fulfill in many different situations.
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Gear Study: Drawings of
gear systems recur throughout Leonardo's notebooks, often, as
here, theoretical rather than applicable to a specific device.
Similar systems to this later appeared in clocks and clock-like
mechanisms, and variations of them are in common use today. |
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Wire-Testing Device: Like
modern scientists and engineers, Leonardo wanted as precise information
as possible about the properties and capacities of materials so
that they could be used more effectively and economically. By
weighing the basket after the breaking of the wire had automatically
shut off the flow of sand he could determine the tensile strength
of the wire. |
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Printing Press: Gutenberg
is generally credited with the invention of the printing press
nearly a half century earlier, in about 1448, but Leonardo seems
to have been the first to attempt a basic improvement by making
it potentially possible for one man to operate it instead of several.
A turn of the screw draws both type bed and paper under the platen
and supplies the pressure to print, while a reverse turn releases
the bed. The first practical applications of such improvements
had to await the early 17th century. |
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Variable Speed Drive:
Another theoretical gear system that anticipates a number of modern
applications. By meshing the three cogged wheels of different
diameters to the same lantern wheel, three different speeds of
rotation result, a principle used in the transmission of the modern
automobile. |
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Hydraulic Screw: By encasing
a waterwheel, the water turbine was developed in the early 19th
century. Leondardo's horizontal impluse wheel, driven by the weight
of falling water, and his hydraulic screw were important steps
in this direction. Like the turbine, the hydraulic screw works
with greater efficiency and a smaller water supply than the older
overshot or undershot type waterwheels. |
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Spindle-Shaped Hull: Intensive
study of the action of water and the shapes of fish led Leonardo
to design hulls of greater stability and less friction &127;than
the round-bottomed vessels then generally in use, and somewhat
similar to certain sections of mod em racing hulls. Each side
of the model illustrates a different design, each developed from
an experi mental and functional point of view similar to that
of modern engineering and marine architecture. |
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Double-Hulled Ship: If
the outer hull of such a vessel were damaged, either by enemy
action in time of war, or by reefs or floating wreckage, the inner
hull, still intact, would keep the ship afloat. In more recent
times both double hulls and the division of the interior of the
vessel into separate compartments by watertight bulkheads have
carried Leonardo's ideas toward still greater safety at sea. |
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Two Level Bridge: In reserving
the upper level for pedestrians and the lower for vehicles, Leonardo
used the same idea for traffic control that appears in his plans
for an ideal city in which entire streets were thus restricted.
The truss is similar to a type used in bridges since the early
19th century. |
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Rotating Bridge: Designed
to connect an island stronghold with the mainland, this bridge
could be swung across a stream or moat and back again by means
of windlasses. Swing bridges have proven to be practical only
in relatively short spans. |
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Flying Machine: This early
design called for a wooden framework and two movable wings to
be activated by the aviator who lies prone in the framework, and
works the wings by pulleys connected with stirrups moved with
his feet, aided by the windlass worked by his hands and arms.
In later designs, often with more than a single pair of wings,
Leonardo has the operator standing upright. |
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Helicopter: Leonardo was
fascinated with the form of the spiral which often appears in
nature, and is involved in the principle of the screw. His helicopter
takes the form of an aerial screw, following the example of a
device earlier brought to Europe from the Far East in the form
of a children's toy. Of his design for the helicopter he wrote,
"If this instrument made with a screw be well made - that
is to say, made of linen of which the pores are stopped up with
starchÑand be turned swiftly, the said screw will make its spiral
in the air and it will rise high." |
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Parachute: "If a
man have a tent made of linen of which the apertures have all
been stopped up, and it be twelve braccia across and twelve in
depth," Leonardo wrote, "he will be able to throw himself
down from any great height without suffering any injury."
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Scaling Ladder: To reach
the top of the wall of an enemy fortress, Leonardo designed this
scaling ladder in a form similar to that employed today in fire-fighting
apparatus. It is elevated and lowered by means of the crank and
the large toothed gear. |
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Triple-Tier Machine Gun:
There are eleven barrels in each tier. While one is fired, another
tier is loaded, and the third cools. This weapon, like others
Leonardo designed, shows him constantly attempting to achieve
greater fire power. |
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Military Tank: Leonardo
designed this ancestral version of the tank to carry heavy fire
power and be driven by men working the enclosed wheels with cranks.
Its turtle-like cover was intended to deflect enemy fire. "These,"
he wrote, "take the place of the elephants. One may tilt
with them. One may hold bellows in them to spread terror among
the horses of the enemy, and one may put carabineers them to break
up every company." |
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Hygrometer: The humidity
of the atmosphere may be determined by measuring the imbalance
caused by the absorption of moisture by the cotton, which, wwen
dry, is equal to the weight on the other side of the scale. Leonardo
spent much time studying the atmosphere both as an artist and
as a scientist, recording in drawings many of the effects he observed.
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Odometer: Leonardo often
made maps, both for military purposes and for canal construction.
He therefore designed several distance-recording devices, including
a pendulum type pedometer and the odometer. The latter is one
of several variations on an instrument described by the Roman
architect and engineer, Vitruvius, whose works were rediscovered
early in the Renaissance. It was geared to drop a pellet into
a box for a given number of revolutions of a wheel, thus computing
the distance traveled. |
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Inclinometer: Leonardo
always sought the greatest possible accuracy, and therefore was
constantly designing devices for measurement, such as this instrument
to determine the degree of incline of a given surface by the relation
of the plumb bob to the concentric scale inscribed below its mounting.
The accurate figuring of slight gradients was of great importance
in laying out canals. |
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Anemometer: A device for
measuring the force of the wind by reading on the quadrant scale
the highest point to which the vane, hinged at the top, is blown.
"The air," Leonardo wrote, "moves like a river
and carries the clouds with it, just as running water carries
all the things that float upon it." |
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Clock: For greater accuracy,
Leonardo designed a clock mechanism with two separate trains,
one for minutes and the other for hours, each complete with escapement,
gears, and weight. Weight-driven mechanisms had been associated
with clocks for so long that they had come to be regarded as exclusively
for this purpose, but Leonardo used them for the increased automation
of other machines, such as his file cutter. Clocks registering
both hours and minutes had become sufficiently accurate during
the 15th century so that they were even occasionally used in astronomical
observations. It may be that Leonardo had some such purpose in
mind when he designed his dual train mechanism. Real accuracy
in clocks was not achieved until the use of the pendulum as a
regulating device in the 17th century, yet Leonardo made a drawing
of just such a device in a form applicable to clockwork. |
