An Incredibly Satisfying Twisty Variant

Pretzel by "AndEleven puzzles" aka Kiernan Anderson

I had not seen anything like this until I saw the Pretzel puzzle at the IPP design competition table and everyone around the tables seemed to be fascinated by it. The interesting thing was that even people who would normally shy well away from twisty type puzzles would still pick this up and fiddle with it. Yes, very few of them would go on to solve it and, in fact, most would just fiddle, chortle to themselves and put it down. The tactile nature of it was something that everyone was delighted by. I myself spent a fair bit of time at the table trying to solve it but whilst I made progress, I couldn't manage it in the time that I had. However, it was something that I had said to myself that if I could find a way to buy then I would definitely spend some money and add a copy to my collection and spend more time on. Luckily Hendrik had a whole bunch for sale at his IPP table and also a few other designs which had not appeared in the competition.

Orb-it

Hungarian Rings

Those of you who frequent the Twistypuzzles forum will have seen Kiernan introduce a bunch of these fancy new bead puzzles over the last year. They seem to have been very well received and many people have played and solved them. I personally have had an on off fascination/relationship with bead type puzzles ever since my dear departed friend Felix encouraged me to attempt the original Orb-it puzzle. After my success with the Orb-it, Felix encouraged me to other bead puzzles like the Hungarian rings which I reviewed in the same post.

Interestingly, I had found these very challenging despite their apparent simplicity and had very much enjoyed them. For people who can't work out their own solution the amazing Jaap still has his website up giving solutions to lots of these combinatoric type puzzles. The Orb-it is here. and the Hungarian rings is here.

After those, I eventually moved on to more and more complex twisty puzzles and was entirely unaware of new bead puzzles until the IPP. Having bought a couple of these from Hendrik, I brought them home and immediately got too frightened to scramble them. I was very frightened that there would be absolutely no way that I would ever be able to solve them. I experimented and took some photos to show the moves:

1 rotation

1 rotation and a slide

There is something wonderful about fiddling with these. The beads move smoothly around the track which includes an "underground" section and the spinner section is aligned using magnets so it clicks into place so nicely. Anyone picking this up will just fiddle with it for the sheer tactile delight of it. I watched lots of people do that very thing at the IPP. Eventually, having fiddled with it for a few days I got up the courage to scramble it. 

What have I done?

There is only so much that you can do with this. Move the balls around the full track or twist the spinner to isolate 18 of them in 2 long and 2 short tracks. The easy thing to do is build up sets of three and then sets of six and store them in the isolated sections until you need to use them. It's not actually difficult to get to an almost there point until you suddenly discover that all the balls are grouped together but they are just one or two positions out of the alignment that you need. I was stuck with an almost there position for quite a long time until I suddenly saw a way to shift them along one step at a time. Aha! I am now able to save this one very time I play with it.

On Kiernan's Etsy product page about this puzzle he states that this is difficulty level 5 out of 10 and I personally would say that it should be a 3 or 4 compared to most other twisty type puzzles. He says:

Rubik’s Cube enthusiasts with algorithmic experience typically solve it within a few hours and afterward consider it a modest challenge. Focused adults or teens with general puzzle experience—but no cube-solving background—should find it quite challenging, but solvable.

If you’re brand new to puzzles or aren't used to logical / sequential challenges, consider one of my easier alternatives.

Looking at his store front, the puzzles that are lower difficulty level look horrifyingly difficult to me but you should take his word for it - he should know.

I did also purchase from Hendrik the Delta puzzle (3 colour version) which Kiernan has assigned a difficulty level of 7/10 and I have not had the courage yet to scramble it. Every time I play with it, I get the shudders and the urge to put it down quickly before I do something I can't undo!

The Delta (3 colour)

one loop and one ∞

This can have all of the beads on a single trefoil track or by turning the spinner (as usual with a very satisfying magnetic alignment) it can be split into 1 ring alongside an infinity shaped track opposite. What could possibly go wrong?

Kiernan's own description rates this as a level 7 or 8 and says this about it:

The 3-Color Delta is special — it's my favorite design so far and my personal go-to puzzle. It’s a serious challenge, yet still highly intuitive to explore. As you experiment, you gradually begin to feel the kinds of moves the puzzle wants, developing an understanding of its mechanics through intuition as much as logic. Because you can separate it into two tracks and cycle only some of the beads, it feels more intuitive than the Infinity with 3 colors.

But with three colors to solve simultaneously, planning ahead is still quite complex. Even experienced twisty puzzle enthusiasts and seasoned Rubik's Cube solvers should expect a substantial challenge.

The claim of being highly intuitive really does mean that I should just go for it. Gulp!

If you are interested in these bead puzzles then you really must go to Kiernan's Etsy store - I probably should add a few more to my collection!

Finally, I did purchase another puzzle that I did not expect to. I love twisty puzzles but haven't actually played with any for over a year due to lack of time and being distracted by other stuff. But almost as soon as I entered the IPP puzzle party room I was confronted by Diogo Souza and some of his absolutely incredible 3D printed twisty puzzles. My previous experience of 3D printed twisty puzzles has been very variable. The original Shapeays twisty puzzles always dropped black powder all over the place (Puzzle Maestro's 3x5x7 cuboid was one of the first). But then later home printing improved things a lot until TwistyTex's version of the same cuboid was so much more usable that I should have started buying more of this type of puzzle. I had fallen out of the scene a little and was staggered to be confronted with Diogo's amazing designs. I spent a god 20-30 minutes chatting to him before going agains what I had originally thought because I couldn't resist buying a copy of his Sprout cube which is a combination of an edge turner and corner turner.

Sprout cube by Diogo Souza

This also frightens me to death because the pieces interchange/jumble. The movement is so smooth that it is wonderfully tactile to fiddle with. The discussion of the solving process on the TP forum is just a little frightening!

What should I do? Scramble the Delta or the Sprout Cube? Hmmmm! 

Diogo's puzzles are for sale via his Instagram page - I probably should buy some more. Shouldn't I?

Very Nearly An Idiot!

PIL Box

PIL Box by Richard Williams

I very nearly didn't have anything for you today. I have had a rather busy week and am actually going to be working as this posts. I have furiously been trying to solve something all week and until about 2 hours ago had nothing to write about. I went back to another of the IPP exchange puzzles that I have been trying to work out off and on since I got it in June.

I had been encouraged by the fact that Fraser had assured everyone that even an "idiot can solve it". I suspect he is doing himself a disservice - he seems to be pretty good at solving puzzles - especially compared to me - but then you all know that I am not terribly bright. 

Pack 3 pieces

This creation from Richard Williams was his exchange puzzle at the IPP which he was kind enough to give to me despite me not being an exchanger. It promptly went into the pile to be solved (which is currently GIGANTIC) and due to the easy idea of packing 3 pieces through a limited entry hole into a box kept me coming back. Easy idea maybe but easy to do? Nope! But if the "idiot" can solve it then I didn't want to show myself to be worse than that (moron?)

It's very nice and tactile. The  pieces have to be placed through a hole at one corner that it eccentric and has an odd chamfer to one edge. The I and L shapes are easy to insert but the C shape has to be inserted with a fun rotational move which can only happen in one direction. Working out which order to place them is the start - it turns out that they get blocked up really fast! Other rotational moves once a piece is inside is very limited due to a single blocked voxel inside the box. 

I had been stuck for weeks. I kept going with my Einsteinian approach of trying the same thing and variants of it again and again! As usual this did not have the desired effect and I was forced to think©. Fraser said it was sneaky so I did one of my moves a few more times in the hope that it would be sneaky if I did it again. Nope! Eventually I tried something which shouldn't have worked and it didn't because I did it wrong but then thunk about how else I could do it. Aha! Damn, why didn't I think of that before? I'm not terribly bright. I finally had my pieces packed inside the box and felt very foolish. He's a sneaky bugger that Rich. Very fun puzzle to play with and great to show non-puzzlers. They will be very annoyed at you when you show them the secret. Thanks mate.

---

I have to blame Allard for this. I read his review and put myself on the waiting list for a few weeks when it suddenly came up for sale again. It's rather large and Mrs S was most unimpressed at the space it takes up. She was even less impressed at the enormous customs bill I had to pay!

Yes, it is the ECD-trilogy (Entity Containment Device Trilogy) puzzle set from Nothing puzzles in Australia. It is beautifully made, significantly heavy and looks like it might well be another puzzle I cannot solve (based on watching Rich and Dan fail to complete it at MPP). Lot's of fun coming up!

A Fun Week Of Torturing

Ice Cream SandWitch

Having had a bad week last week, I was really motivated to get back into it for this post. I took the three TICs that Allard gave me to work and tortured a couple of lovely girls who surprised me with their tenacity.

Georgia - my ODP

Even the radiographer!

Caduceus pieces

I had worked on Caduceus first after writing my post last week. It looks the easiest of them having only 2 pieces to fit inside. The fun thing about it is that both pieces have circular rods in them which implies that they will both need to undergo rotations to get them placed.

The first thing to do is go through some thinking© to work out which direction each of them need to be placed across the cubic frame. I was gratified to see that both girls who tried this puzzle did exactly the same thing before attempting the insertion. It's nice to see that thought is universal with puzzles. 

Having established the direction of travel we experimented to see how the individual pieces could be moved into place and then see whether the second one could be manipulated around the first. Oh boy! They really get in the way of each other. There are a LOT of moves and they dance around each other a huge amount. There are so many rotational and sliding moves that for me it is impossible to keep track of them. I managed to assemble it last Sunday evening and then couldn't take it apart again for a very long time.

Damn! That was tough

Eventually I separated the pieces and watched in fascination as Georgia and one of the other theatre staff worked on it and was very gratified to see that they had the exact same experience. Both really enjoyed it and were keen to try the others. I love infecting others with the excitement of puzzling! Especially girls - we need more girl puzzlers.

The next 2 of the TICs from Alan Lunsford were Cobra and Hydra:

Cobra has only one rotational piece

Hydra has 2 rotating pieces

Cobra has the advantage that the two frame pieces are just like simple interlocking cube puzzles and relatively easy to work out where they go together but then whilst it is simple to see where the rotating piece has to go, it is actually a huge challenge to insert it into position. With everything you try the piece almost arrives but not quite. Many possible moves leads to the thing falling apart. None of the girls managed to get past this point and it was with some trepidation that I attempted it myself. It is damned tough. There is a very very nice sequence to get the thing assembled. Luckily with this one, once you have done it then the disassembly is not going to be hard to manage. It is really clever and perfect to get someone hooked - the ability to get so close and yet so far away is wonderful for the experienced as well as the newbie puzzler.

Hydra has 2 rotational pieces and it doesn't take long to work out where they have to go. Like the Caduceus, there is a whole lot of dancing with some rather extreme moves before it eventually slides together. Disassembly is also a challenge. It took me a good hour before I could say that I really understood the puzzle. I will be taking it to work to torture people for a few weeks.

Cobra assembled

Hydra assembled

If you have a 3D printer (Sob! Never me!) then I suggest you go to Alan's Printables page and download the files for these and make yourself some TICs - they are simply fabulous!

Next up, I tortured myself with George Bell and Nan Ma's Dodecahedron assembly kit. I spent quite a lot of time in the IPP design competition room in Italy attempting several of the challenges set out with these and completely failed. I came to the conclusion that my hands are too small or the pieces were too perfectly made with not enough gaps to help me. But, I am a sucker for a puzzle kit and the five challenges sung to me. I started with the easiest of them (rated medium) and after nearly an hour yesterday, I finally managed an assembly. Hooray!

Dear Lord! That was tough and it was the easiest!

I spent another couple of hours trying various of the other challenges and got absolutely nowhere apart from to teach the cats some swear words and to piss off Mrs S with all the muttering under my breath. The pieces can be assembled gradually by gently pulling apart and adding extras. This continues until there's no space for any more and then as long as the assembly is correct there's a space for the final piece but no way to insert it. Time to take a few out and place them in a different order. Finally you have to pull it apart to the almost falling to bits position and try and manoeuvre the last piece or pieces and let it collapse together into shape. Unfortunately, I have been completely unable to manage it - I pull it apart to the almost falling to bits and then as I wiggle, it just "falls to bit" - Aargh! I'll keep at it for a while longer but I'm losing hope. I saw a friend at the MPP manage them all but I have no idea how.

Finally I have to show off the Ice Cream SandWitch puzzle which I also solved this week.

Ice Cream SandWitch by Alexander Dangl
I never noticed the mis-spelling until now!

This puzzle was also an entry into the Design competition this year where it won a Jury Honourable Mention Award. I actually didn't play with it myself at the IPP because I had immediately decided that I wanted to buy a copy having seen p[eople enjoying it and with lots of shouts of delight as they solved it. The following day at the main puzzle party, I quickly found it for sale and got hold of a copy. Let me say straight up - it's a lovely thing and great fun to solve with plenty of Aha! moments.

It is available in 3 ice cream flavours (pistachio, vanilla and the strawberry that I have). The aim is to work your way through finding and using tools to get yourself the coin to allow you to buy more ice cream. At the moment it is available from PuzzleMaster and sold out at Tye and Amanda's Nothing Yet Designs (they may well get more n stock in time).

Initially, the only obvious tool is a bolt that slides part way out when you tilt the puzzle downwards. The first thing to do is work out how to release the bolt and then see where it can be used to make other things happen. The first couple of moves are quite easy to find and will lull you into a false sense of security. I managed those first couple of steps very fast and then got stuck for a while. I had a bolt, a magnet and that was it. There are lots of magnetic areas inside the puzzle but I was unable to manipulate them. I had to put it down for a while due to demands by the present wife that I do some stuff for her. Later on, I returned to the puzzle and noticed something really quite subtle. Aha! I now had...another magnet and nothing to do with it.

I'll not tell you what I did next as I don't want to spoil it for any of you but I have to say that you need to use physics to solve this one and after another few moves you have your coin to allow the purchase of more ice cream. It's wonderful and certainly a candidate for my top ten(ish) of 2026. I will be bringing this to work to torture people as well. My work bag is always shoulder bruisingly heavy because I bring so many great puzzles with me. Torturing people is fun!

A 3D Printer Is NOT Allowed

Thank Goodness I Have Puzzle Friends!

Dodecahedron Assembly Kit by George Bell
Printed by Allard (thanks mate)

I am absolutely amazed - my post views have passed the 7 million since I started writing in March of 2011. Thank you for reading my crap!

 

After the last 2 weeks of desperately trying to solve the upcoming Pelikan puzzles as quickly as I possibly can, I have been rather fatigued and not actually done any puzzling at all this week. So I don't have anything to really review today. I did attend the MPP number IIXIIXIIXIIXIIXII yesterday (yes that does seem to be a Roman numeral! Allard needs to remember the number L for simplicity.) and one of my favourite things when I go there is to pick up a bunch of plastic freebies that Allard and other friends have produced for visitors to take home.

I have a rather big birthday coming up soon and I had hoped that maybe a Prusa or Bamboo toy-maker with all the multi-colour trimmings might be a possible gift from she who frightens the Gods - I even suggested it to her (Whack! Ouch!) However, the present Mrs S is very frightening. She has said on numerous occasions when I mention a possible purchase, that the arrival of a 3D printer in her house (NOT mine) is definitely grounds for divorce and I really cannot afford a divorce! This means that it's absolutely NOT happening, no matter how nicely I ask. No, she is not worried about noise or electricity usage. Her primary reason for the absolute moratorium on this wonderful technology is that she is aware that the profusion of wood and metal "stuff" that keeps arriving and cluttering the house will rapidly be supplemented by a huge bunch of "ugly plastic crap". Modern 3D printers produce stuff that is much less ugly now but she does not want yet more puzzles arriving courtesy of the printer. Sob! Luckily, I have wonderful friends like Allard, Rich and Dan who can make 3D printed puzzles which I can smuggle in without risking life, limb and sanity. Oops! Sanity went a very long time ago.

One puzzle set that arrived yesterday courtesy of Allard was George Bell's incredible entry into the Assisi IPP design competition. Whilst it didn't win an award, it was a fabulous challenge which I spent quite a lot of time on. Interestingly, I had almost no success. It is a series of coordinate motion challenges and I left Italy rather frustrated thinking that it was impossible for someone with relatively small hands. I do tend to pride myself on having fairly decent hand control and dexterity (on Wednesday I had to put a cannula in a vein on the front of a patient's shin under ultrasound guidance!) but I really struggled with it. At the MPP the puzzle was attempted by a few people and even the most difficult combination was assembled successfully. I now have the option to try them myself in the privacy of Puzzlemad HQ without anyone laughing at me with every failure.

Another advantage of a 3D printer is that all the wonderful new TICs that get designed can be quickly added to a collection without having to wait for a craftsman to make them in wood. I adore TICs and interlocking puzzles. Allard had 3 new TICs from Alan Lunsford sitting to be taken home. They were smuggled into the house with my MPP box and secreted quietly where she can't see.

Caduceus

Cobra

Hydra

I can't wait to work on these. 

So, in the absence of my own 3D printer I will be "forced" to attend MPPs so that I can endure being made fun of but still manage to pick up plastic toys without being told off. See you all at the next one.