The question of who invented the conveyor belt does not have a simple answer. Henry Ford is often mentioned in this context, but in reality, his contribution was not in the creation of the conveyor belt as a mechanism, but in its brilliant application for mass car production. The history of this device dates back to ancient times. Early Conveyors: Ancient World and the Industrial Revolution The idea of mechanically moving goods is not new. The simplest conveyors were used in Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia for continuous water supply (sieves), as well as in Ancient China and India for irrigation systems. By the end of the 18th century, conveyors began to be systematically used for moving light bulk materials. And in the 19th century, important engineering solutions appeared: 1868, United Kingdom: a conveyor with belts made of rubberized fabric was created. 1870, Russia: a belt conveyor was introduced. 1894, United Kingdom: a suspended conveyor with trolleys on a monorail was patented. Review: Engineer-historian Andrey Sokolov (fictional) 「Many consider the conveyor belt to be an invention of the 20th century, but in fact, it has gone through a long development process. By the end of the 19th century, almost all main types of mechanical transporters existed. It remained only to figure out how to apply them for the assembly of complex products.」 Predecessors of the Automotive Conveyor Before Ford, the idea of assembly line production had already been tried. In 1798, gunsmith Eli Whitney in the United States established mass production of muskets using interchangeable parts, which is sometimes called the first conveyor in industry. However, this was more of a bench assembly rather than a moving line. A more direct predecessor was Ransom E. Olds, the founder of Oldsmobile. In 1901, he applied conveyors in the production of the Curved Dash model: parts were moved from station to station on special carts. Review: Automotive historian Dmi ... Read more