Leonardo Da Vinci’s Self-Powered Cart (2021)
selmec.org.uk
selmec.org.uk
This da Vinci example is a true celebration of Meccano.
“That's okay, I brought an Erector Set.”
“Throw a towel over it!”
“Do some pushups, Pablo, Maybe it’ll go away.”
Fascinated by that toy growing up, I credit it to a large part with having a very good grasp of basic engineering. Levers, pulleys, wheels, axles, gear ratios, bracing, structural integrity, load dynamics... all learned by doing while still in elementary school. There aren't many toys that can teach those skills on a screen, not like building and testing actual equipment.
I will pass it on down to one of my grandkids some day and hope they grow up loving engineering and creating mechanical dreams like I did.
But Leonardo was a genius precisely because his insights predated the experimental and iterative science spirit that came later, and which were necessary to produce practical technology. Can’t we just accept that his helicopter designs suck, his submarines were impractical, and his car was nonfunctional? They are still amazing and fascinating. Why contort or correct the designs to make them work?
Because the end goal is something functional. If Leonardo was actually building it, he would have done the same.
Sorry, a weird dude designing helicopters and tanks some 500 years before their invention, among his incredible research in other scientific fields, is nothing short of remarkable for anybody, unless you are a professional internet cynic, which is as mundane as air itself.
>They are still amazing and fascinating.
Doesn't look like cynic or contrarian.
Leonardo da Vinci was human, he had flaws, he wasn't always right, and I think these are important things to point out in order to make the real achievements stand out.
Leonardo's flying machines were crap, which is to be expected when basic understanding of aerodynamics came hundreds of years after. Helicopters in particular are deceptively complex. And it would be a shame to put them on the same level as mechanisms he designed that actually worked.
I think it sets unreasonable expectations if you don't recognize the flaws of great men. And especially in science, being wrong happen, and it is not even a flaw.
I don't really understand nor respect such an opinion. It is putting yourself on a moral pedestal by pointing out the flaws of someone more accomplished than you. Superiority by proxy, and it adds nothing to the conversation.
No one has said to make a statue of him and celebrate it as deity. I'm saying it is not a FLAW to imagine and design something 500 years before we can build it in the first place. Of course it is faulty.
What have you designed that will be talked about in half a millenium?
However the idea is not to put myself on a pedestal. I am not special. Not only I have my own flaws, of course, but if you think I try to put myself on the same level as Leonardo da Vinci, which is true in some way, as we are both people, I also put you on the same level as Leonardo da Vinci.
I don't know you, but like me, you are probably not a genius people will hear about half a millenium later. But you probably have some qualities neither I nor Leonardo da Vinci have. And on these points, you would make a better role model.
I don’t think any, or many, people believe da Vinci had no flaws. He was, however, indisputably brilliant in many ways, and is the literal embodiment of the Renaissance Man / Polymath.
It takes a specific type of person to be confronted with a persons’ achievements and say “well, you know, they still had their flaws, and not all of their ideas worked.” Da Vinci was a known self-critic, nobody was harder on him than he was on himself: he lamented on his deathbed that he had offended god for not being better at his art.
I’m unsure what you are contributing to the discussion.
The first trial I made at a windmill blew apart in the first storm and you might not even have recognized it. Back to school, 6 months of learning, lots of math and engineering later: a scale model 1:2 to check if I got any better at it, that one worked but produced too little power for its size but we figured out why. Scale that up to 1:1 and it worked like a charm and powered our house for a couple of years. Without the failures there would be no success.
Isn't this precisely what GP said?
Erector/Meccano set is a solution waiting for a problem.
And you don’t get to the front of the internet making a daft version of Leonardo Da Vinci.
I was very much inspired by human capacity to imagine the things that don't exist, and often couldn't even be created by the time they are imagined. Da Vinci's machines, first computers (Babbage's "analytical engine"), modern works like fusion power or quantum computers for example. And as new technology is invented and new discoveries are made we continue challenging ourselves.
Having said that I am certain humans are not the only ones able to do so. So I will live this open-ended like this, just a tribute to the marvelous complexity of the intelligent life on Earth.
Da Vinci was essentially a 'maker' but he didn't have todays tools, and you have to wonder what he would have been able to imagine with that kind of access that we today haven't seen yet and then go do that!
At the same time: in the 1600's almost everything related to technology was still in the future and Da Vinci didn't even know about the possibilities of some of the fundamentals of technology yet. So without much knowledge about electricity, magnetism (though there was some of this it was very rudimentary) and other 'common' knowledge nowadays he was able to see very far indeed but only on those parts of science that were well illuminated at the time.
That said, one of the oldest energy captures is a watermill. It's powered by gravity.
Hydroelectric energy storage is one example that is hugely successful, albeit requiring geography to help. We also use water towers in some places to maintain pressure in pipes with the hydraulic head.
On a smaller scale, it's more space efficient to use weights to store rotating energy as a flywheel.
That said, stored energy in a system isn't always a desirable property, generally it means more careful designs are needed so that the system defaults to safe.
Leonardo da Vinci's self-powered cart, often considered one of the earliest forms of a robotic vehicle, was powered by a coiled spring mechanism. Here's how it works:
Coiled Spring Mechanism: The cart was powered by a pair of coiled springs, which were the main source of propulsion. These springs were wound up manually, storing potential energy.
Gear and Pulley System: Once the springs were wound, the stored energy was transferred through a system of gears and pulleys. This system was designed to control and direct the movement of the cart.
Steering Mechanism: Da Vinci's cart also featured a programmable steering mechanism. By setting pegs into a series of gears, the operator could predetermine the cart's path, allowing it to turn and move in specific directions.
No External Forces: The cart did not require any external forces like animals or humans to push or pull it once the springs were wound. The energy stored in the springs was enough to move it forward.
Early Example of Automation: This invention is significant as it represents an early example of automated transportation, displaying Da Vinci's advanced understanding of mechanics and engineering.
Leonardo's self-powered cart was far ahead of its time, showcasing his genius in mechanical invention and his ability to think centuries ahead of the technological capabilities of his era.