18th-century inventions
115 inventions and discoveries: year, what it is, what it evolved from and what it led to.
| Year | Invention | What it is | Evolved from | Led to |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1701 | Seed drill | Tull’s mechanical seed drill. | ||
| 1703 | Binary number system | Numbers made of zeros and ones (Leibniz). | Hindu–Arabic numerals | |
| 1709 | Coke | Baked coal; Darby used it to smelt iron. | ||
| 1711 | Tuning fork John Shore | A standard of sound frequency (Shore). | ||
| 1712 | Boiler | A vessel in which water turns into steam under pressure. | ||
| 1712 | Newcomen engine Thomas Newcomen | The first practical atmospheric steam engine, for pumping water out of mines. | Pressure cooker | Watt steam engine |
| 1712 | Orrery | A mechanical model of the Solar System. | Planetarium | |
| 1714 | Thermometer Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit, Hero of Alexandria | An instrument for measuring temperature (Fahrenheit, mercury). | ||
| 1718 | Tourniquet | A means of stopping bleeding (Petit; Esmarch’s tourniquet). | ||
| 1725 | Program control of a machine Herman Hollerith, Charles Babbage | A machine’s sequence of actions is set by a replaceable medium — punched tape, punched cards, a program in memory. | ||
| 1725 | Punched card Herman Hollerith, Charles Babbage | A card in which information is encoded by the presence or absence of holes. | ||
| 1725 | Bouchon’s loom | Basile Bouchon’s loom, controlled by a perforated paper tape. | Pinned cylinder | Jacquard loom |
| 1727 | Silver halide | A light-sensitive silver compound. | ||
| 1727 | Photochemical reaction | A chemical change caused by light. | ||
| 1729 | Electrical conduction | A substance’s ability to conduct current (Gray). | ||
| 1731 | Sextant John Bird, Abu-Mahmud Khujandi | An instrument for measuring the altitude of celestial bodies. | Octant | |
| 1731 | Octant John Hadley, Thomas Godfrey | Hadley’s reflecting angle gauge — the forerunner of the sextant. | Davis quadrant | Sextant |
| 1732 | Pitot tube Henri Pitot | A sensor of flow speed from pressure. | ||
| 1733 | Flying shuttle John Kay | Kay’s shuttle that sped up weaving. | ||
| 1735 | Cobalt Georg Brandt | A metal in the cathodes of lithium-ion batteries. | ||
| 1736 | Graph theory Leonhard Euler | The mathematics of vertices and edges; the Königsberg bridge problem (Euler). | ||
| 1738 | Lift | The force created when air flows around a wing. | ||
| 1738 | Venturi effect (Bernoulli’s principle) | A flow’s pressure drops where its speed rises. | ||
| 1738 | Automaton | A mechanical figure that performs set movements; Vaucanson’s automata. | Jacquard loom | |
| 1745 | Capacitor Ewald Georg von Kleist, Питер ван Мушенбрук | Stores electric charge. | Leyden jar | |
| 1745 | Capacitance | The ability of conductors to store charge; the capacitor is based on it. | ||
| 1745 | Leyden jar Ewald Georg von Kleist | The first capacitor. | Capacitor | |
| 1746 | Zinc | A metal for brass, batteries and galvanizing. | ||
| 1748 | Platinum Julius Caesar Scaliger, Antonio de Ulloa | A precious metal — a catalyst. | ||
| 1751 | Nickel Axel Fredrik Cronstedt | A metal for alloys and batteries. | ||
| 1751 | Encyclopedia | A systematic compendium of knowledge (Diderot’s Encyclopédie). | Wikipedia | |
| 1752 | Lightning rod Benjamin Franklin | Leads lightning into the ground (Franklin). | ||
| 1759 | Bimetallic strip | Two strips of metal that bend when heated (Harrison). | ||
| 1760 | Index card | A card for systematizing information (Linnaeus). | ||
| 1760 | Photometer | A light meter. | ||
| 1760 | Roller skates John Joseph Merlin | Shoes on wheels. | Ice skates | |
| 1760 | Industrial Revolution | The shift to machine production. | ||
| 1761 | Latent heat | Heat is absorbed during evaporation and released during condensation (Black). | ||
| 1761 | Marine chronometer John Harrison | Harrison’s precise clock for finding longitude. | Pocket watch | |
| 1764 | Spinning jenny James Hargreaves | Hargreaves’s multi-spindle spinning frame. | Spinning wheel | Spinning mule |
| 1765 | Separate condenser | Watt’s invention: steam condenses outside the cylinder, greatly raising efficiency. | ||
| 1766 | Hydrogen Henry Cavendish, Mikhail Lomonosov | A light gas; it filled airships and fuels rockets. | ||
| 1766 | Jigsaw puzzle John Spilsbury | A picture made of pieces (Spilsbury). | ||
| 1767 | Railway track | A track of rails on sleepers. | Wagonway | Time zones |
| 1767 | Shower François Merry Delabost | Water supplied from above. | ||
| 1767 | Carbonated water | Water charged with CO₂ (Priestley). | ||
| 1769 | Watt steam engine | A steam engine with a separate condenser — the prime mover of the Industrial Revolution. | Piston pump, Newcomen engine | Internal combustion engine, Tractor, Thermodynamics, Steam turbine |
| 1769 | Arkwright’s water frame | A spinning machine driven by a water wheel. | Spinning mule | |
| 1769 | Steam carriage | Cugnot’s steam wagon — the first self-propelled vehicle. | Car | |
| 1770 | Eraser | Rubber for erasing graphite (Priestley, Nairne). | ||
| 1770 | Kitchen scale | Scales for food. | ||
| 1770 | Spring balance | Scales based on the stretch of a spring. | ||
| 1771 | Liebig condenser | A water-cooled tube for condensing vapour. | ||
| 1771 | Factory | Production with machines under one roof (Cromford). | ||
| 1772 | Nitrogen Daniel Rutherford | The main gas of the atmosphere. | ||
| 1774 | Oxygen Carl Wilhelm Scheele, Joseph Priestley | The gas that supports combustion (Priestley, Scheele). | ||
| 1774 | Ammonia Joseph Priestley | The basis of nitrogen fertilizers and a refrigerant. | ||
| 1774 | Chlorine Carl Wilhelm Scheele | A gas for disinfecting water and making PVC. | ||
| 1775 | Trap (siphon) | A bent pipe holding water that blocks odours. | ||
| 1777 | Torsion balance | Measuring tiny forces (Coulomb, Cavendish). | ||
| 1777 | Oxidation | A reaction with oxygen or a loss of electrons (Lavoisier). | ||
| 1778 | Samovar | A vessel for boiling water with an internal firebox. | ||
| 1779 | Photosynthesis | Plants turn light into chemical energy (Ingenhousz). | ||
| 1779 | Spinning mule Samuel Crompton | Crompton’s spinning machine. | Spinning jenny, Arkwright’s water frame | |
| 1780 | Toothbrush | A brush for cleaning teeth. | Electric toothbrush | |
| 1781 | Planetary gear | Planet gears around a central sun gear; Watt used a “sun and planet” gear. | ||
| 1783 | Tungsten Juan José Elhuyar, Fausto Elhuyar | The most refractory metal; lamp filaments. | ||
| 1783 | Parachute | A canopy that slows a fall; the knapsack parachute is Kotelnikov’s, 1911. | Paraglider | |
| 1783 | Hot air balloon | The Montgolfier brothers’ balloon. | Airship | |
| 1784 | Wrought iron | Low-carbon iron (Cort). | ||
| 1784 | Puddling Henry Cort, Samuel Baldwin Rogers | Converting pig iron into wrought iron in a reverberatory furnace. | ||
| 1785 | Bucket elevator | Buckets on a belt or chain lift bulk goods (Evans). | ||
| 1785 | Diffraction grating | Splitting light into a spectrum with fine lines (Fraunhofer). | ||
| 1785 | Power loom | Cartwright’s mechanically driven loom. | Loom | |
| 1785 | Coulomb’s law Charles-Augustin de Coulomb | The force between charges; the torsion balance. | ||
| 1786 | Threshing machine | A machine for threshing grain (Meikle). | Quern, Flail | Combine harvester |
| 1787 | Alarm clock | A clock with a signal (Hutchins). | Smartphone | |
| 1788 | Feedback control | A controller compares the result with the goal and corrects the process. | ||
| 1788 | Centrifugal governor James Watt | A speed regulator with spinning weights; used by Watt. | Cruise control | |
| 1789 | Uranium Эжен Пелиго, Martin Heinrich Klaproth | A heavy metal — nuclear fuel. | ||
| 1789 | Flanged wheel | A wheel with a rim that keeps it on the rail. | ||
| 1789 | Bleach | Hypochlorite (eau de Javel, Berthollet). | ||
| 1790 | Mechanical pencil Sampson Mordan, John Isaac Hawkins | A pencil with a retractable lead (late 18th century; Hawkins and Mordan’s patent, 1822). | Pencil | |
| 1791 | Library catalogue | A card catalogue (France). | Database | |
| 1791 | Soda ash | A raw material for glass and soap (the Leblanc and Solvay processes). | ||
| 1791 | Burette | A graduated tube for titration. | ||
| 1792 | Optical telegraph | Chappe’s semaphore line. | Electrical telegraph, Railway semaphore | |
| 1793 | Cotton gin Eli Whitney | Whitney’s machine that separates cotton fibre from the seeds. | ||
| 1794 | Rare-earth metals | A group of elements for magnets, phosphors and catalysts. | ||
| 1795 | Hydraulic cylinder | A piston in a cylinder moved by pressurized liquid. | ||
| 1795 | Conveyor belt | An endless belt on rollers for moving goods. | ||
| 1795 | Hydraulic press | Bramah’s press: a small force on a small piston gives a large one on a large piston. | ||
| 1795 | Corkscrew | A spiral screw for corks. | ||
| 1795 | Metric system | A decimal system of measures (France). | ||
| 1796 | Vaccine Edward Jenner | Preventing a disease with a weakened pathogen (Jenner). | ||
| 1796 | Exercise bike | A stationary bicycle. | ||
| 1796 | Music box | A pinned cylinder plucks a comb and plays a tune. | ||
| 1796 | Lithography | Printing from a flat stone (Senefelder). | Offset printing | |
| 1796 | Smallpox vaccine Edward Jenner | Vaccination with cowpox (Jenner). | ||
| 1797 | Extrusion | Pushing material through a die (Bramah). | ||
| 1797 | Chromium Louis Nicolas Vauquelin | A metal that makes steel resistant to corrosion. | ||
| 1799 | Paper machine | Continuous paper production (Robert, Fourdrinier). | ||
| 1800 | Electrochemical reaction | A chemical reaction in which electrons flow through an external circuit — the basis of batteries. | ||
| 1800 | Interchangeable parts | Parts of one type are identical and fit any product. | ||
| 1800 | Voltaic pile | The first chemical source of direct current. | Lead–acid battery, Dry cell, Electrolysis | |
| 1800 | Infrared radiation William Herschel | Invisible heat radiation (Herschel). | ||
| 1800 | Electrolysis | Decomposing a substance with an electric current (Nicholson, Carlisle). | Voltaic pile | |
| 1800 | Lead screw | A screw that moves a machine’s carriage precisely. | ||
| 1800 | Chemical plant | Industrial synthesis of substances. | ||
| 1800 | Sleeper | A crosspiece that holds the rails. | ||
| 1800 | Direct current | A current flowing in one direction. | ||
| 1800 | Mine ventilation | Airing the workings. | ||
| 1800 | Wheelset | Two wheels rigidly fixed to an axle. | ||
| 1800 | Screw-cutting lathe | A lathe with a lead screw (Maudslay) for cutting precise threads. | Lathe | |
| 1800 | Test tube | A glass tube for experiments. |