Great Puzzling Comes in Twelves!

Time For More From Pelikan

Minima puzzles no 5 to 12

Number 1 to 4

It was only a month ago that I wrote about the last release from Jakub, Jaroslav and team's Pelikan puzzles. At that time they had beautifully reproduced the first 4 in the Minima series designed by the incredible Frederic Boucher. This time the next 8 are here in yet another gorgeous selection of woods and you really need to add them to your collection. The four from the last release that I have written about are still available as individual puzzles or a set of four. There is a Minima 13 but only so far only released by Frederic himself and Tye Stahly) it is possible that will also become available in the future as well.

From Nothingyetdesigns

Original from Frederic XIII

If they are going to be released like the last set then they should be in sets of four as well as single puzzles. The wood choices are perfect:

Minima 5 - Limba and Bubinga

Minima 6 - Ash and Ovangkol

Minima 7 - Wenge and Maple

Minima 8 - Ovangkol and Zebrano

Minima 9 - Acacia, Padauk and Wenge

Minima 10 - Zebrano, Purpleheart and Maple

Minima 11 - Merbau and Padauk

Minima 12 - Bubinga and Acacia

Obviously, like the rest of the Minima puzzles, the aim is to pack the pieces into the box and leave it so that no gaps are visible through either the large holes, small finger holes or slots that facilitate rotational moves (if the number of voxels is less than the 12 that would completely fill the box). Continuing with the pathway that the first four took, these get progressively more difficult but are always very fun to solve. The rotations are beautifully facilitated by the various holes and slots cut into the box and no force is needed. Some of the rotations are really quite tricky to work out and in several puzzles there are multiple rotations for one piece. As before, the wooden box makes the challenge much more difficult as you cannot see what is happening inside once a piece or two have been placed. I had not managed to solve Minima 8 in the acrylic box version despite months of trying after receiving them in September last year. Minima 8 doesn't look like too much of a challenge with 3 simple L-shaped tri-ominos and a single 3 voxel straight stick but there I had huge problems with it and was gratified when a couple of correspondents agreed that it was a really difficult puzzle.

Minima 9 and 10 are slightly different having pieces of 2 colours and whilst packing is the aim, the difference is that with Minima 9 the puzzler has to place them so that only one of the colours is visible through the holes in the box (for that one there are 2 solutions - one for each colour). Interestingly, I found one colour quite a bit harder than the other. Minima 10 has only one solution and needs to have only the vibrant Purpleheart visible from outside of the box. Minima 11 and 12 are very deceptive having relatively simple pieces and quite a lot of large holes in the box but they are also a huge challenge - almost as difficult as number 8. They both took me 2 or 3 days to solve but at least not the several months of the former. 

These puzzles are so much fun and this explains why I have a HUGE collection of these Minima puzzles of varying types and from various designers. Basically I will purchase any of them when released to add to my collection. I would say that these are ESSENTIAL purchases for anyone seriously into packing puzzles - they are stunningly beautiful and a fabulous challenge and the Pelikan team have made them so well!

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Empire

Empire by Jorgos Anastasou

Bottom view

The other puzzle being released by Pelikan alongside the 8 Minimas is the Empire burr by Jorgos Anastasou. This beautiful and complex 11 piece burr is presented as a rather dense block structure with a sort of dome on the top as would be seen on an emperor's palace. It has been made with a lovely set of woods (Padauk, Wenge, Acacia, Purpleheart and Maple for the vertical sticks forming the dome and a very warm Cherry for the walls). The first move is very well hidden partly because the pieces are quite snug and it required a good bit of pushing, prodding and pulling to find what could move. Once you have found the first move then it is quite quick to remove the first piece (there are just 5 moves required to separate it from the puzzle) but removing the next piece will prove a considerable challenge. It is only another 7 moves but finding the correct ones was very difficult for me. I went round and around in circles for a long time failing to find a critical move until I found it quite by accident. Unfortunately I did not notice what I had done until I realised that new positions were available to me and I was completely unable to backtrack! After a good half-hour of trying to return to the start, I gave up and continued with the disassembly which was great fun as it remains pretty stable right to the end. The final disassembly level is 5.7.1.2.3.2.2.2.1.2 which doesn't look terribly challenging but for me it is just right!

Reassembly required me to have a lot of fun with Burrtools but I think that those of you who remembered your pathway might manage without it and the genii amongst you might just manage to put it together from scratch. 

Jorgos is really designing some fantastic puzzles and I am so pleased that Jakub is agreeing to make them available to us in such fancy woods. This one will look stunning on display in your collection.

Don't Be A Coward!

If You Dare - You Will Probably Win!

Who Dares Wins aka Haleslock 6
A fabulous design by Shane Hales in collaboration with the Two Brass Monkeys

Today is a day for locking metal stuff or unlocking it.

The first thing I should tell you all is that Big Steve and Ali (the Two Brass Monkeys) have released their latest creation, the Bag O'Tangles and you should all go there and buy it/them. I saw the pre-production version at the last MPP and immediately decided that I needed to buy a copy when I saw it there - it has just gone up for sale and I have placed the order to pick it up at the next MPP at the end of the month. If you aren't sure then read Allard's review to be convinced. Apparently they can all be nested together for a final master challenge - if nothing else convinces you, then that certain should!

In August last year, I purchased the 6th in Shane's series of lock puzzles. When you have all the others it would be rude not to continue collecting and Mrs S definitely agreed with that. Whack! Ouch! or maybe not! 😱 

The Who Dares Wins puzzle is still available from the Two Brass Monkeys site and you definitely should get one whilst they are still available. I had no idea what a rim cylinder lock was until I got this. I had always called the classic door lock on a British front door a "Yale" lock but that is apparently a trade name for the type of lock I grew up with on my front door and certainly in retrospect, from the top this thing would not be out of place embedded in a door. Shane had created a prototype puzzle from one of these and showed it to the monkey boys and they all colluded to create something that did not require a puzzler to carry a door around with them (Mrs S would definitely have disapproved quite strongly had I brought in an extra door!). As soon as they were available to purchase one arrived and I took me customary photos. It is nicely shiny in brass and some anodised aluminium with a key on a keyring and a helpful tag with the instructions - open the lock and find the golden padlock. It is all delivered in a Jute bag. This thing is pretty weighty at 380g with dimensions of 36mm diameter and 88m long.

I'm glad this one was so attractive as it stayed on display in my pile o' puzzles to solve for many many months! I played and played and played with it daily, then weekly then monthly since August last year and got absolutely nowhere! At some point during the 9 month wait I even retrieved the jute bag and turned it inside out searching for hidden tools in the sewn edges. I've been caught by that sort of thing before and refuse to be caught again - at least until the next time!

Looking at it, there is not much to really see that gives any immediate clues. Putting the key in the lock and trying to turn does the usual nothing at all - it won't turn but at least the key comes out again. Fiddling with the brass collars gives a teeny hint that they might be involved at some point as there is a fraction of a mm movement in one of the three but no rotation. After discovering that, there is nothing else to be found for a VERY long time. I am sure that all of us do the usual of trying to insert the key to varying depths and attempting to turn it - no, that doesn't work either. Then it's time to attempt it with the puzzle in a whole lot of different positions. I am getting a bit too old to be doing handstands with a puzzle but at least I didn't hurt myself.

Looking very closely at the puzzle does give a small hint at one of the things that Shane has done to the insides of this thing to convert a standard lock into something that won't open with a key but seeing it doesn't really help. At least it didn't help me! Remember, I am not terribly bright.

Right from the very beginning there was something that I wanted to do but didn't have what was required to do it and with these you are not allowed to use anything that you haven't been given. This was one of the reasons I went to the jute bag at least 3 or 4 times to see whether I had missed anything. I really wanted to do one particular thing but never had the courage to do it. This was a deliberate part of Shane's devious design! He knew that no puzzler would be happy doing what he knew was necessary, hence the name of the puzzle - if you were going to win with this one then you had to be daring and try something special. I was a coward! Month after month I didn't dare to try it until in desperation I did the unthinkable. 

AHA!

OMG! I cannot believe that he did that! All of a sudden after 9 months of cowardice, I was daring for the first time and I managed my first step. Now it was time to explore further. Don't solve this puzzle anywhere where you might lose small pieces because after a further 10 or 15 minutes you will find some "stuff" dropping out (in my case into my lap and into the grooves of the sofa cushions). 

Solved the bloody thing - I had my golden padlock!

Once the lock is open you can see how simple and yet ingenious the design is. Shane is relying on people not having the courage to do what is necessary and, from what I can gather talking to other puzzlers, he is absolutely right - not many of us are willing to be daring. at least not until we get absolutely desperate. That man is a genius! I texted Shane when I had finally solved the bloody thing and he actually wrote:

"I wanted to psychologically f..k people over      I guess it worked perfectly!"

 It certainly did! B.st..d! But finally after all this time I can place it on display in the lock section of my display cabinets, much to the pleasure of Mrs S.

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MW Puzzles keyring

I had missed out on the whole of Matthew Williams' puzzle designs as they seemed to go viral via the Mechanical puzzle discord and I just don't have time to get involved in that. I saw a few of his incredible creations at the MPP and they all looked fabulous but I resigned myself to only getting to look at them at puzzle parties. I even missed out on the second run of Pinball Wizard puzzles because they went up for sale whilst I was anaesthetising a weekend trauma list and they sold out in about 5 minutes - I was 2 hours late! 😭. 

Get that key out

My only experience of MW puzzles' creations was the Keyring 1 (I have heard that a Keyring 2 might be released sometime soon). I managed to acquire this at a Midlands puzzle party and I think I received it as a gift from Matthew (thanks mate!) This lovely little thing is made of steel, brass ands a few acrylic bits as well. It has been in my work bag for over a year! The aim is to remove the key from the lock and then put it back and trap it again.

The key is inserted in the keyway at one end and doesn't move much at all. There is a very small amount of wiggle room but it certainly won't turn or pull out. Looking at it you cannot see what mechanism inside might be preventing the movement.

The only thing that you can do is move the brass collar - it can rotate and it can be pulled a few mm towards the far end to pushed back. At some point during the movement of the collar you can see a red something inside.

Red insert inside?

There appears to be a pin

Fiddling with this collar eventually reveals a pin and it feels like that pin can be moved but when the collar is rotated back to the start position the pin is always back in place. It feels like that pin needs to be extracted outwards into the brass collar to release something inside.

I spent over a year trying to get that damn pin to do something and failed. Now, with many puzzles there are lots of things to try and you keep attempting different combinations of various things until you get enough information to progress to the next step. Both of today's delights have none of this progression - there is absolutely nothing new to try and only one or two tiny little movements which don't get you anywhere. I sometimes think that these puzzle designers are out to drive me crazy......crazier than I am already!

After a year of fiddling and doing the same 1 or 2 things over and over and over again, I noticed that something had changed. It would appear that Einstein was wrong - sometimes doing the same thing again and again for a very long time does actually make something happen on one occasion. Or maybe it happened every time but I failed to notice it.

That was rather interesting; if only I actually knew what was the cause. Determined to put another puzzle away, I continued with my repetition and before I knew it, there was a major change inside. More repetition was required until I had yet another of those

AHA!

moments!

I had no idea how this was working but I finally had my key:

At last! Another puzzle I can put on display.

Could I put it back to the start? Yes I could. It's very clever and I am slightly ashamed of myself that it took me so long to work out what was required. Thank you Matthew for keeping me occupied for a year! I need some easier puzzles for a while!

Good Puzzling Comes in Three's?

Three Pieces? Or Three Puzzles?

TripTIC

NeuroTIC

You cannot have too many Turning Interlocking Cubes! Especially made by Brian Menold or designed by the "Master of the TIC" - Andrew Crowell. Brian's last update had 4 TICs in it and I picked these 2 because I already had copies of the other two (SkepTIC previously from Brian and remaining unsolved as well as XiTIC from Bernhard:

XiTIC pieces

XiTIC assembled

I really need to find my copy of SkepTIC and solve the damn thing - I seem to remember that I bought it in March last year and could not assemble it and have put it down somewhere - who knows where!

SkepTIC pieces still to be assembled

When Brian offered these puzzles that I did not have in my collection, I could not resist. Well, you all know that I struggle to resist many puzzles that are put on sale and have really annoyed Mrs S by continuously increasing the size of my collection and failing to put them away. She was distinctly unimpressed when they arrived. I had been hoping to intercept their arrival without her noticing whilst I have had a few days of annual leave over the last 2 weeks. Unfortunately, she had me doing DIY and gardening for much of the time off and I couldn't get to the door in time to intercept before she got there. I was wiring in replacement smoke and fire detectors and up a ladder when the package arrived! I nearly fell off the ladder in my haste to get to the door first but she's too damn quick! 

In the evenings after finishing my enforced chores and (for once) not electrocuting myself, I set to playing with these fascinating TICs. The fun thing about both of the new arrivals is that they have only three pieces in each:

TripTIC made from Paduak, Canarywood and Angelique wood

NeuroTIC from mixed woods

I started with the "easy" one, TripTIC, as it only had 2 rotations and 11 moves. and quickly found the end positions for each of the pieces and individually found the rotations but when trying to put all three pieces together the pieces interfered with each other's moves. until I found a very nice little position for one that opened up a hole for the introduction of the other and after about 15 minutes I had a lovely little cube:

See! I can solve the odd puzzle occasionally!

Time to move onto the harder one...NeuroTIC also has 3 pieces but despite having only 2 rotations, it has a higher level of 13.3 and as Brian puts it: "some interesting moves". I definitely struggled on this one. I quickly determined the final resting positions but putting any third piece into the mix quickly blocked me. I couldn't seem to work out which piece to use first and I ended up having to solve this over 2 days. Yes, I forced Mrs S to allow me a little puzzling time during my time off. Whack! Ouch! Sorry dear. As Brian said, there are some really clever moves involved here and the final rotation that allows the rest of the puzzle to slide together is absolutely delightful. 

Absolutely wonderful assembly process

Disassembling the puzzle caused me a little trouble. I got all caught up and had a piece trapped and unable to release it despite working out the correct rotation first. This could easily also be a disassembly puzzle. 

I really never know how to store these puzzles - should I keep them disassembled? Or should I keep them as lovely looking cubes to be taken apart - this would help with storage but decrease the repeatability of the puzzles.

Of course, I couldn't buy just 2 TICs from Brian. I had to make the postage worthwhile - I also couldn't resist a third one being released by him from the amazing Haym Hirsh, the Green T-Box:

Green T-Box

I had already bought the original T-Box by Haym back in December 2021 and thoroughly enjoyed the sole process of packing 6 T-shaped bars into a beautifully designed box so how could I possibly resist a reworking of the original idea with another 6 T's of different dimensions and a different set of obstructions in the box? Again, it was beautifully embellished.

After spending a few minutes trying to rearrange the pieces in vertical positions from the placements they arrive in, I quickly realised that vertical placement was definitely not going to cut it! This one is damned fiddly - the tolerances of the woodwork is astonishing! Even a tiny amount of tilt to a piece will get it wedged in amongst the other pieces and require a frenzied shaking and tapping of the box on your palm to free them up. After ½ an hour of repeated attempts in the box, I had to start to think© outside the box and realised that it was not quite a case of simply shoving the pieces inside in the correct order and orientation. The pieces needed to be placed and some of them slid into position inside. It's a very satisfying feeling when the final piece drops in and the lid fits on top snugly.

Trust me, all the T's are inside

What is next for Brian and Haym? Will we have Black T-Box? Oolong T-box? Who knows! Whatever it is, I will not be able to resist. 

Thank you, Brian for a week of delightful puzzling to take my mind of the DIY and gardening. In fact, I have had quite the roll this last couple of weeks - I look forward to showing the completed puzzles off to you over the next couple of weeks.