Leonardo's genius

For my weekly Wednesday reminder that I’m retired, I went this week to the Leonardo da Vinci Machines Exhibition at the Denver Pavilions. For anyone who loves to tinker and who takes great pleasure in trying to figure out how things work, this exhibit is a total treat. It’s also a treat for anyone who is fascinated by genius—artistic, mechanical, scientific, architectural, across-the-board genius. For those with a historical/cultural bent, there’s a 45-minute movie about da Vinci's life and times. I was too fascinated with the inventions and ran out of time before seeing most of the movie. Good reason for a repeat trip.

Leonardo da Vinci is probably best known as an artist, but it was his inventive genius that caught my attention when my partner sent me the link to the exhibit website. There, I found pictures of all these models of his inventions. How could I not want to check these out? The models have been created from da Vinci’s drawings by artisans using the sorts of tools and materials that were available in his time. Apparently he left behind about 45,000 loose sheets of paper with notes (mostly in mirror writing), drawings, thoughts, experiments, and ideas for inventions. Some have been gathered into books, most of which are owned by museums around the world (except for the one that Bill Gates owns).

Waterwheel-driven saw - a gear-driven mechanism
moves the saw up and down and also slides the lumber forward

Ball bearings and spindles - freely moving parts reduced
friction, allowing one surface to move easily on another
("Lazy Susan" anyone?)

This description of da Vinci's study of chains
also shows the detail of his drawings

You can see about 60 models of his inventions at this exhibit, along with prints of several of his paintings (Mona Lisa, The Last Supper, and others). The inventions range from war machines through flying machines to a flood lamp and a 360° mirrored closet. Some have “Do not touch” signs, but others are interactive (those, of course, were my favorites. Tinker, tinker.) A large group of inventions and “studies” (where he played with ideas, tried out things without any particular end in mind) reflect da Vinci’s interest in mechanics. Turns out he either invented or pioneered in the development of such fundamental mechanisms as ball bearings, gears and gear-shifters, chains (which weren’t re-invented for another 300 years), differential gears for carts, pulleys, worm screws, fly wheels, hydraulic drills, systems to translate circular motion into linear motion, and a gadget that proved the impossibility of perpetual motion. Many of these were incorporated into his inventions: countless hoisting systems, modes of transportation (a horseless carriage, skis to walk on water, the bicycle, flying machines), gun turrets, robots, and on and on.

Differential gears allow a 2-wheeled cart to turn corners.
The design is basically like that used in cars today

This cart requires no horse. It moves using energy released
by the leaf springs, which is translated into forward motion
by the gears.

The things da Vinci invented depended partly on who his employer was. For instance, he lived in an era rife with wars—warring lords, warring fiefdoms, warring countries. So a lot of his inventions were designed as offensive or defensive weapons. These included an armored vehicle (forerunner of the tank), numerous devices to scale walls and to repel others trying to do the same, ship-borne mechanisms that tore apart enemy ships with a scythe, a multiple-cannon rotating turret for a ship, catapults, and more. The worst beast of all was a horse-drawn cart with four long blades that stretched out horizontally from the cart’s midline, rotating as the cart moved to cut a swath through any group gathered in the vicinity. Horrendous, though brilliant.  

The war monster - blades set rotating by the cart's motion
slash at anything in its path as horses pull it forward

Ship loaded with a scythe to tear apart enemy ships.

  

The original life preserver,
designed by da Vinci

Others inventions reflected his fascination with flight, including his famous “helicopter” and several designs for wings that a person might wear. Still others displayed his interest in water, including the first-ever design for the now-standard life preserver, another apparatus to allow a person to breathe while under water, and over-sized inflatable shoes to walk on water (with poles for balance). 

Some of his inventions have proven amazingly enduring, like the double-hulled ship, which kept the ship afloat even if a cannon ball ripped through its outer hull. It's now standard on commercial and military ships. Or the hinged ladder, which is now used on fire trucks. da Vinci designed it to scale enemy walls while being able to retract it at will if hot oil flew over the wall … but it’s still ingenious.

Double-hulled ship

Hinged, retractable ladder

And then there were his studies of anatomy, which he employed to magnificent ends in his painting and sculpture. (Reverting to his mechanistic frame of mind, he also designed a robot, clothed in a knight’s armor, based on his understanding of the mechanisms of the body.) Although one of his patrons was a Pope and the Catholic Church frowned on dissection, as an artist, da Vinci was given permission to participate in dissections, and his anatomical drawings are evidence of the care he took in this endeavor. Some of them are creepy (to me), but nonetheless fascinating. Unfortunately, I didn’t take any pictures of these … you’ll have to go see for yourself.

"The Last Supper" as a backdrop to gears and gizmos

The exhibit lasts through January 2013. Go see it – you’ll be glad you did!

Oh, and plan enough time to see the film …

Proof that perpetual motion is impossible.
You have to see it to understand (then please explain it to me)