Pelikan Summer Release Part 2 - The Wonders Continue!

Seven puzzles due to be released soon

Last week I reviewed the first four of the upcoming Pelikan summer releases and they were all amazing. I had to keep the final 3 back as they are much more complex and were going to take me a LOT longer to solve. Thank heavens there was no pressure from Jakub to solve them quickly!

Tau

Arrival packing position

Pieces are very odd

The reason for the name

I have to start off by saying that this puzzle is the pick of the whole release this time. It is abso-bloody-lutely amazing! Dr Volker Latussek has a mind like no one else and he comes up with some absolutely stupendous challenges that will keep you incredibly busy and will have you sitting back open mouthed in wonder after you have solved them. The Tau puzzle is possibly one of his very best yet. 

I had been a bit mystified at the name - none of the pieces looked like the greek letter and I had not really looked terribly hard at the arrival position before taking the pieces out and even if I had, it actually requires a bit of squinting the eyes and some photo editing to realise it. It actually took an email from Volker himself with a photo to make me understand. In the arrival position, the gap in the top surface forms a letter Tau. I am not terribly bright and I actually struggled to put the pieces back into the box in the start position to take a proper look (yes this is another challenge for you. The aim here, like quite a few of the recent Pelikan challenges, is to pack the four interesting pieces into the box such that the top surface is completely covered (the inside will have quite a few gaps in it). Volker did tell me that the challenge had been influenced by the wonderful No holes barred puzzle designed by Laszlo Kmolnar and beautifully made by Brian Menold that I had reviewed a few years ago:

No holes barred

The single 45º cut single voxel in the entrance to the box was going to be a major issue with the solution here but that was only one part of the considerable challenge. First of all you have to find a shape that you can build that would fill the entrance and be stable sitting on a work surface. There are quite a few ways to make that shape but not many are self supporting and then you need to find one that is even vaguely possible to be placed into the restricted opening left by the half cube. I had imagined all sorts of nice diagonal sliding movements and whilst there is one of these sliding movements, it is not where I expected it to be and was a relatively minor part of the challenge. I found it a fun challenge to reduce my solution set to just one possibility. Having convinced myself that I knew the placement I had to work to put them inside. OMG! What a tremendous challenge! It has taken me a whole week to find the solution and on numerous occasions I had convinced myself that I needed to go back to the drawing board with my assembly to start finding new possibilities. It was with huge relief that I made the cat shoot off my lap with a shout of joy! This puzzle is BRILLIANT! Volker is a genius! Buy it!

The version that Jakub and Jaroslav had manufactured had been made from wood that had not dried out enough and had shrunk after manufacture. This does not interfere with the solution but leaves a bit of looseness in the packed puzzle and they are remaking the whole batch. This may delay them going on sale.

Dino 2

Dino 2 by Alfons Eyckmans

One of the most prolific burr designers in the world, Alfons Eyckmans is producing some fantastic and beautiful puzzles. My favourites are either his cube or cuboid puzzles (of which I have an embarassingly large number) and the burr zoo with all sorts of creatures hidden inside many different types of burr shapes. This particular beauty is an unusual 14 stick burr with a dinosaur inside. The woods chosen by Pelikan are a gorgeous vibrant Purpleheart, Padauk and Wenge with an Acacia dinosaur. Many of this type of puzzle can be impossibly difficult and consequently not so much fun unless you are a huge fan of ultra complex burrs. Jakub's skill here lies in choosing the versions that are just the right challenge and still a whole lot of fun to explore. The movements are beautifully smooth with the puzzle being just tight enough that pieces don't slide about without your control and there is a very nice logic to it. The solution level is 11.5.4.2.3.3 which for me is fun and challenging without becoming impossible (fun is what I am after and not horrendously difficult). Amazingly, once I had found the removal of the first two pieces, I thought the third (adjacent) piece would follow straight away but this was not the case. This had me stumped for a good 15 to 20 minutes as I desperately tried to free up a piece that was not going to be released until 2 others had come out first. After the first 5 pieces are out the puzzle is remarkably stable but now there is a LOT of possible movement and this is where most people will get stuck. I had tried everything possible - it was all moving all over the place but nothing was coming free (remarkably there was only one rotation at this point and it was not useful). I was getting anxious that I would be left with a tangled mess of sticks that I could not advance or go back when suddenly I had another Aha! moment and a critical pieces was removed (I had my dinosaur). This made a lot more space for disassembly and it rapidly came apart thereafter and I was able to take my photo:

Roar! 

There is no way that I will reassemble that without Burrtools but that is part of the fun. My burr zoo is getting quite extensive and I love it!

Maahes

Twins?

Yes, you have seen this puzzle before on my blog! This wonderful design by Terry Smart was previously made by Stephan Baumegger. I wrote about it in 2016 when it made it to my top ten puzzles of the year.

I am delighted that Pelikan have decided to make more copies available to everyone as it is a stunning burr that looks lovely on display (the twins are on display on my mantlepiece along with my other animals) and as well as that, it is a really fun challenge with some really hard to find moves. The disassembly level is not terribly high at 15.3.4.2.2 but several crucial moves are incredibly well hidden and there are a lot of possibilities that open up to you as you work your way through. I remembered that I really struggled with Stephan's version and I did it again this time. Don't tell Mrs S but I could probably go back to all my old puzzles and have absolutely no recollection of them and solve them again as if I'd not done it before - I probably don't need to buy any new ones but where is the fun in that? 

After a couple of days of desperately trying to find the missing move, I had my breakthrough. Even after that there are still a lot of moves to sort through o find the rest of the disassembly. I had a wonderful time and now have to go back to my BT file to reassemble it. This one is beautiful on display and a perfect medium challenge.

The grain of the wood is gorgeous.

I don't know when these will be released but I doubt it will be very long. Which ones should you buy? All of them of course but if you cannot afford that then I would suggest that Tau is an absolute essential and after that it depends on your personal tastes. If burrs are your thing then Maahes and Dino 2 are wonderful and fun and of course the Zeus by Osanori-san is a beautiful object which is easy to disassemble and tough to put back together. You cannot go wrong with the classics from Stewart Coffin and mixing the two together adds a whole new dimension to them. If packing puzzles are your thing then don't underestimate the multiple challenges of the Broken box by Lucie.

Terry Produces Something VERY Smart

Alastor

My health continues to improve but I remain extremely easily fatigued - just walking along a corridor at work or climbing a couple of flights of stairs renders me totally shattered. After 3 months on a waiting list I was finally able to buy a Concept2 rowing machine and I plan on starting some decent exercise as my fatigue allows (the gyms here remain shut and I wanted to continue exercising - yes I know I could go running but I hate running and I get awful shin splints). It was a bit of an epic experience getting the rowing machine upstairs and assembled! It nearly killed me! I really hope that it will help with my continued recovery. The only downside is that the only spare room for it is my second puzzle room!

My friend Terry Smart spends half of his time working off-shore on a North Sea oil rig. This means that he either has a LOT of time on his hands or very little. The usual work pattern for these guys is 2 weeks on rig and 2 weeks at home. A few years ago Terry spent a lot of time teaching himself to use Burrtools to design interlocking puzzles that were just a lot more interesting than the usual. The issue then was that he had to hope that one of our entrepid craftsmen would see his design and choose to make a few copies for the puzzling world. This was too much of a problem for our Terry and he decided in true Scottish fashion (yes, he shares the same impetuous genes that my wife has and which cause me a LOT of pain -  Whack! Ouch!    I rest my case!) to do something about it - he dived headlong into woodwork. I would love to do this but at the moment my livelihood depends on me having the correct number of fingers and after seeing the tablesaw injury 2 weeks ago, I think I will continue like that. Terry went to the internet and bought himself some of the best equipment for small scale woodworking that you can buy - he bought a whole bunch of stuff from Byrnes Model Machines and then had to pay an astronomical customs fee before he got his hands on it. I got a copy of his very first production series - Premiere and loved it.

Terry recently announced a few new puzzles that he was planning on making and asked for people to sign up to buy them to give him an idea of how many to make. He also offered a few of us the chance to buy more expensive versions with fancy woods and, of course, you know I cannot resist the chance of gorgeous wood. It took him a while to get the batch done and half way through he realised that he needed a way to indicate correct orientation of some of the pieces for reassembly. In other words the puzzle has alternative assemblies which are less difficult or less interesting and there needed to be a method to mark the correct way for entrepid puzzlers attempting reassembly without computer assistance. A number of options were discussed and in the end we settled on stainless steel pins sunk into the relevant pieces - I think they look very nice. My version is made from Olivewood (frame), Lignum Vitae (long burr pieces) and Arizona Desert Ironwood (short burr pieces). It is gorgeous and surprisingly heavy for such a small puzzle (8 x 6 x 4cm) - the Ironwood and Lignum Vitae are very dense woods. The puzzle also has a nice musky aroma.

I received the puzzle about 2 weeks ago and after it was released from Mrs S' quarantine, I had a quick look.  Terry was clearly not entirely happy with these special ones because prior to asking for payment he dropped the price and asked for our opinions. I was curious to see why he had been unhappy with them. The one thing that was immediately clear was that the puzzle was really quite loose but not so loose that pieces could be rotated or fall out without the correct sequence being used. When I took it into bright light for photos I could also see that there were some tool marks on the pieces but I did not feel that they detracted too much from the look. I hoped that the looseness would not make the puzzle too hard to solve - I doubted that Terry would send something out that was not going to function.

This puzzle is a really nice level of difficulty with a disassembly level of 16.11.8.5.3.3.5 - not impossibly tough but should be a fun exploration and sequence. It might also be possible to manage an assembly once taken apart. I enjoyed the exploration and it was only made a little harder by the looseness and required me to lift pieces a little to ensure that I could slide them. There are a couple of rotations which can happen and one will allow an early first piece removal but I ignored this. After about 30 minutes of progress, a piece fell out onto the sleeping cat on my lap and rolled off. I had no idea exactly how it had come out and I knew a Burrtools file would be needed for my first reassembly. The second piece came out in a rather unexpected fashion and then the third, despite being a very similar shape to number 2 came out a totally different way - this was lovely. The entire exploration is nicely visible and there are no blind moves to ruin things. After a few more minutes I had my lovely wood separated:

Just look at the gorgeous grain on that Ironwood!

I made my BT file and  back together. I love making BT files and this was a nice easy one. Having solved it the first time I wanted to see whether the reassembly might be possible without the computer. I spent a few hours over a couple of evenings, just exploring - going back and forth to understand how the pieces interacted and then disassembled it and scrambled the pieces and left them a few hours. Attempting the reassembly with a proper understanding of the puzzle was even more fun. I was able quite quickly to work out the intended end position of each piece and from that retrace a path back to the beginning. I seldom enjoy a puzzle reassembly but this one was really quite pleasant. I have done it quite a few times now and it is becoming a bit of a worry bead for me.

The other versions that Terry created using other less expensive woods did also look lovely and the fit was very good for them - this is one craftsman to keep an eye on for the future as his skills improve. It is pretty amazing that he is making pieces like this already and not using any glue at all! Stunning!

Thanks mate, I can't wait for the next puzzle!

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Still no further progress on Andrew's Lock out puzzle! Needless to say but Allard's suggestion of using celery did not work. So far I have inserted the keys and tried to turn them several thousand times! Hopefully I can't wear them or the keyway out?

A New Kid on the Block...

Makes His Premiere Puzzle

Premiere from Terry Smart

I have known Terry Smart for quite a few years now. He appeared in the various Facebook puzzle groups around 2013 (as far as I can recall) and seemed to be as good at buying puzzles as I was and just about as bad at solving them! My excuse is that I am not very bright but his excuse was that he spends a huge amount of time off-shore on oil rigs and and doesn't have access to all his enormous collection for very long. He also freely admits that he is more of a collector/hoarder than a solver. So, not only does he have less time at home than me, but he also doesn't necessarily aim to solve everything.

I remember in 2013 he and I began to develop a little bit of an interest in understanding Burrtools more so that maybe we could use it to design puzzles of interest. I managed to make a couple of designs but really had no idea what I was doing and gave up after a month or so. Terry, on the other hand, kept at it and produced quite a few nice designs and interestingly gave them all wonderful Greek and Latin names...he's obviously much better educated than me too! As far as I know, none of them have been manufactured for the puzzling community to enjoy as yet.

It was with great interest that I watched in the last 12 months as Terry became very interested in starting to manufacture puzzles. Unlike many puzzlers, he chose to try the woodwork route rather than 3D printing which kept me watching with fascination as this is exactly what I want to do on the off-chance that I am ever going to be able to retire from the NHS (at the moment my retirement age is supposed to be 67 which fills me with horror as it is soooo far away). Over the last year we have been chatting intermittently on FB messenger and I have seen him spend ENORMOUS amounts on beautiful equipment from the US and then add a huge customs ransom on top. I was staggered at the amount of spending on something that might go nowhere! In private, he showed me a picture of the design he had produced which I thought was rather advanced for a beginner - the frame was incredibly complex - it would need to be glued to perfection and the tolerances would have to be perfect to get a working puzzle. The trouble with puzzle making is that every tiny error in alignment can be magnified further along a stick until you end up with a non-functioning puzzle once all the tiny errors have been added up.

Just a week ago, he showed off a completed puzzle which looked fabulous...it looked like it had been created by one of the established "masters". A bunch of us expressed interest and Terry wanted a quick assessment by someone with knowledge, experience and puzzle skills. Unfortunately he could only find me and I quickly agreed to evaluate his first produced design which is fittingly called Premiere. I couldn't resist it - it is one of my favourite types of puzzle - a 6 piece burr in a frame! He had attempted to make 4 but, after one broke and the others failed to work, he was left with just the one working copy and during the week it arrived chez moi whilst I was out at work.

So, how is it? I can hear you all screaming at the internet (those voices again!). The puzzle looks lovely - the burr sticks are Maple and the frame is made from Jatoba aka Brazilian Cherry. It has been waxed and lacquered and feels beautifully smooth. The burr sticks have had their external ends all chamfered nicely and amazingly the endgrain all matches perfectly (Terry admits this was more luck than anything else). In the frame, all the glued joints are perfectly aligned and no join can be felt. For a first attempt (or for any attempt) this is BLOODY AMAZING!

What about the solve process? This sort of puzzle is one of my favourites for a reason...it is never too high a level and the process always tends to be fun without being too arduous. In places a few of the moves are a little tight but no real force is required and this is no more than I would find happens with puzzles from Alfons or from Pelikan. There are a number of moves possible and a few blind ends. I got to a point where it looked like a stick or two could be removed but the frame got in the way and I was unable to find another move further along that track. A few rewinds to the beginning revealed that one stick was a little awkward to click into place (possibly due to the very sharp/perfect internal edges catching) and I worried that this was the reason that I was unable to progress. Back and forth I went, peering inside the puzzle to see why the move I wanted to make wasn't happening. In the end, I saw that the move wasn't happening because it was impossible and the wrong move entirely! As I have said...not very bright! Now what? Think©!

I thunked and realised that there was another delightful set of moves to try which I had not noticed the first few (10 or so) times. After this, I had a breakthrough and a piece came out followed by a few more. At no point did it collapse in a heap which was very satisfying. I had a lovely set of pieces for a photo:

Even signed and dated like those by Alfons or Eric

Reassembly was just as much fun. I had some recollection of how it had come apart but had scrambled the pieces and lost my orientation on the frame. Nevertheless, I was able to reassemble the puzzle in just a ½ hour. Wonderful! The puzzle is not quite perfect but is 99.99% there - maybe a tiny adjustment of the interior tolerances or an internal chamfer?

So what is my verdict for this "new kid on the block" or "new kid on the burr"?

AMAZING design! AMAZING craftsmanship!

Even though he is a friend, I would say that he is someone to watch. His skills will continue to evolve and I am sure that his puzzles will be very collectible. He already designs some fabulous puzzles but if he can make them too then we might have another Alfons or Stephan on our hands. Just look at the detail on these pieces:

Terry is planning on making another 10-20 of the Premiere puzzle available within the next month or two and I advise that you should all consider getting hold of a copy! I will be watching out for future designs being produced.

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An assembly puzzle that I am supposed to solve logically?

Logical progression

Eric Fuller has been at it again! He has produced lots of womnderful loveliness to tempt me. Unfortunately, I have spent all my pocket money over the last few months and only had a little bit of change left over. A difficult decision was required and I made it quickly - I had been facsinated by the Logical progression puzzle that had sold out before I got a chance to buy a few months ago. Eric had gotten permission from the designer, Rick Eason, to make another batch. I had missed out (even in just an hour) on the Walnut version but luckily there were (and still are) a few copies of the Maple version left - I snapped it up and it arrived yesterday.

I'd seen it at the MPP and shied away from disassembling it and failing yet again to assemble something in front of all the guys. At home, I just went for it and now wish that I hadn't:

What on earth have I done?

This is supposed to be logical? Lord help me! The cats were very interested in all the protruding dowels and, in an attempt to prevent a lot of chewing occuring, I quickly reassembled it. Something tells me this isn't right:

Less to chew on!

I'll let you know how I get on...IF I get on.