The twenty-three phases
Each phase is a stage of the journey. Inside a phase the entries are in the order they can be made.
PhaseYear 020406080Year 100EntriesProcedures
01First days: water, fire, shelterYear 1 (days 1–7)Earth parallel: Old Stone Age. Goal: nobody dies in the first week.272402Stone, bone, wood and fibre toolkitYear 1 (weeks 2–6)Earth parallel: Stone Age. Goal: a full kit of tools made from what can be picked up.302803Food security and the first campYear 1Earth parallel: New Stone Age. Goal: stored food, planted crops, real houses, so that people are free to do other work.45004Clay, kilns, charcoal and limeYears 1–2Earth parallel: New Stone Age. Goal: control of high heat. Everything in metal depends on this phase.32005Copper and bronzeYears 2–3Earth parallel: Bronze Age. Goal: metal tools that can be cast, sharpened and recast.29006Iron and steelYears 3–5Earth parallel: Iron Age. Goal: cheap, strong iron and a hard steel edge. The blacksmith becomes the centre of the settlement.31007Carpentry, the village, measures and writingYears 4–9Earth parallel: up to 1000 AD. Goal: a permanent village, agreed measures, and a written record so that no skill lives in only one head.53008Farming, cloth, leather and household industryYears 6–18Earth parallel: 1000–1400. Goal: a food surplus, clothes, light, paper, and the first rubber.48009Water, wind and mechanical powerYears 14–22Earth parallel: 1000–1500. Goal: stop relying on muscle. One water wheel does the work of twenty people, day and night.29010Blast furnace, coal, cast iron and rollingYears 20–26Earth parallel: 1400–1780. Goal: iron by the ton instead of by the lump — liquid iron that can be poured, and plate that can be rolled.30011Glass, chemistry, petroleum, rubber and cementYears 24–32Earth parallel: 1600–1860. Goal: the materials that steam and electricity cannot exist without — glass, acids, zinc, oil, rubber, insulation.73012Precision and machine toolsYears 30–36Earth parallel: 1770–1850. Goal: machines that make machines. Without a true flat, a true screw and a true cylinder there is no steam engine.46013Steam powerYears 34–40Earth parallel: 1712–1880. Goal: power anywhere, in any amount, from coal and water.32014Electricity, generators, motors and batteriesYears 38–45Earth parallel: 1800–1890. Goal: turn steam into electric current, carry it by wire, use it for light and motion, and store what is left over.46015Railways, steam and electric cars, the power gridYears 43–50Earth parallel: 1830–1900. Goal: the end state of Book 1 — power, light and transport along the whole island, and surplus energy stored in batteries.460Act IIYears 50 to 100
16The builder's tools: spanners, pneumatic hammer and construction craneYears 51–58Earth parallel: 1880–1910. Goal: the tools that let a few people put up steel frames, bridges and towers: every nut turned, every plate joined, every load lifted.15017The gasoline engine and the forkliftYears 51–64Earth parallel: 1885–1925. Goal: an engine light enough to carry itself, and the machines it makes possible on the road, in the field and in the warehouse.20018High-voltage lines, transmission towers and the multimeterYears 52–64Earth parallel: 1890–1925. Goal: power carried across the whole island and into every house, and the instruments that keep it safe and find its faults.19019Roads, bridges, flyovers and tall buildingsYears 55–100Earth parallel: 1885–1950. Goal: a land that can be crossed quickly in any weather, and towns that grow upward on frames of steel and concrete.23020Epoxy and the materials for tape and screenYears 56–90Earth parallel: 1908–1950 (liquid crystal screens: about 1970). Goal: materials made to order, not found: plastics, fibres, alloys and coatings that the later machines are built from.17021Microphone, speaker, magnetic tape and the telephone exchangeYears 58–85Earth parallel: 1878–1947. Goal: every voice on the island can reach every other, and sound and pictures can be kept, copied and sent through the air.22022The propeller airplaneYears 62–80Earth parallel: 1903–1940. Goal: people fly, safely and on a timetable, and the sky becomes one more road of the island.21023Logic gates, ferrite core memory and the valve computerYears 72–100Earth parallel: 1873–1954 (the flat liquid crystal screen: about 1970). Goal: a machine that follows a stored list of orders and does in a second the sums of a room of clerks, with a keyboard to tell it and a screen to show the answer.310