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How seven small things changed everything
Engineering is about human need and creativity. Nuts and Bolts: Seven Small Inventions That Changed the World (in a Big Way) by Roma Agrawal shows us this truth, not through whiz-bang technology, but the mundane marvels underpinning them – the nail, the wheel, the spring, the magnet, the lens, string and pump. Each of these seven pieces of engineering involved a process of failure and iteration. As they evolved and were used in different permutations, the complexity of machines grew in a cascade of invention.
Humans need something that joins things together, and the nail was invented. The book explains how a nail works, the forces of compression and friction and shear. A nail driven into a wall to hold up a painting uses the same principle as a large bridge. Rivets are essential for airplanes. A screw, ahelical thread wrapped around a shaft, converts rotation to linear movement. A bolt looks like an amalgamation of screwsand rivets and holds skyscrapers and towers together. A 20mm bolt used in construction can take pulling loads of 11 tonnes, equivalent to a double-decker bus.
We also needed something that rotates and revolves, namely, the wheel. The wheel was first used for pottery, not mobility – someone did have to reinvent the wheel to take us forwards. The axle, the rod that passes through it, allowed human settlements to roll outwards. Then came spokes and rims. Gears, or wheelswith teeth, allow us to change the magnitude and direction of forces. Factories need them, as do domestic appliances from blenders, washing machines and dishwashers. Helicopters need wheels with blades, spacecraft need gyroscopes.
To evolve further, we needed power and something that stores it: the spring. It stores energy when squashed,like a ballpoint pen, or when stretched, like a trampoline. Springs are at work in bows and firearms, in anything with a push button, in vehicle suspension systems and injection needles. A piece of versatile engineering, spirals can be cylindrical, spherical or conical. Think of a watch and the complex arrangement of the mainspring, hairspring, and gears – this sensitiveand precise timekeeping made astronomy and exploration possible.
Meanwhile, we have magnets to thank when we make those video calls. Natural magnets were used for geomancy and then for the compass, but it took millennia to understand how magnetism works, with advances in atomic physics and material science. Permanent magnets are in cars, electric circuitry, refrigerators, brakes, body scanners and many other things. Electromagnets have revolutionised communication, from the telegraphto the telephone, from early TV sets to internet ports and wind turbine generators.
The lens let humansplay with light, devise spectacles, cameras, microscopes and telescopes, the basis for breakthroughsin biology and medicine. String, too, is a thing of beauty – interweaving of layers in twists is the wonder of string, first developed by Neanderthals. From wool to cables for bridges, from musicalinstruments to surgical masks, this strong flexible material holds our world together. Pumps, meanwhile, move water and keep us alive, they’re in heart machines, spacesuits, breast pumps.
The book shows that engineering is not an incomprehensible black box; it is at the heart of how we live. Examining these components that create the whole can be empowering. By exploring these building blocks of design, it reveals the complex workings of deceptively simple things.
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This piece appeared as an editorial opinion in the print edition of The Times of India.
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