It's a Zoo in Here!

I seem to have gotten a reputation in the puzzle sphere for being a bit of a savant with wire disentanglement puzzles - so much so that at the Midlands puzzle parties the guys seem to automatically show them to me for a challenge! I personally think the reputation is unearned but ever since I solved and reviewed all the Livewire puzzles they seem to think that I must be quite good at them!

My very good friend Rox also knows how much I love wire disentanglement puzzles (in fact she knows how much I love all puzzles!) So she was kind enough to let me know when the "Master of wire disentanglement puzzles", Dick Hess, had a few little toys up for sale on eBay. I left her to bid on what she was interested in and I went for a few myself. A few emails after I won them, I ended up with a rather bigger haul than I was at first expecting and then another few emails later another huge haul arrived!! I have no willpower at all and hence I am sitting here looking at another 29 puzzles (Please don't tell Mrs S!!)

Stars - Variations on a Theme

Stars?

Over the last 2 years I have tried as much as possible not to repeat myself (at least too much) and have tried not to buy the same puzzle twice. However, sometimes the woods used are too beautiful or craftsmanship of one is just too good to avoid getting a duplicate and sometimes I didn't realise what the underlying mechanism was until I opened it. I repeat (yet again!) that I'm really not very bright and I cannot help it if I'm drawn towards the shiny shiny!

Broken heart?

By George! Burr

Elvis sang:

Please don't break my heart in two
That's not hard to do
Cause I don't have a wooden heart

I can hear you all now!! "he's lost his marbles again!"

Bear with me - there is a point to this!! You all know that I just love wooden puzzles (in fact I have just realised how much I love them when I looked at my puzzle database and saw how much I have spent on them over the last 2.5 years!!). So I was heartbroken to see that wooden puzzles can be broken very easily! Now when my package arrived from Bernhard Schweitzer (Puzzlewood) it looked like the Royal Mail had been playing football with it and unfortunately 3 of pieces had broken a glue joint. This meant that when I picked it up, it just fell apart in my hands and there were a lot more than the 6 pieces there should have been! I asked Bernhard for information on the pieces and he sent me a copy of Ishino's listing of the puzzle. My DIY skills are pretty reasonable for doing things around the house but I am by no means milimeter accurate! The problem, then, is 3 fold:

1. Can I work out which piece goes where?
2. Can I glue it and clamp it with enough accuracy to leave me with a functioning puzzle (tolerances are really tight on these)?
3. Can I avoid being murdered by Mrs S for getting glue where I shouldn't?

I managed to work out what went where, got my trusty clamps and wood glue out (Thanks Ali for stopping me using Superglue - I did get quite a lot everywhere and had it been Superglue then a trip to the Accident and Emergency dept would have been required - she packs a mean kick/punch/stab/laser stare and whiplash tongue). After 24 hours, I put the now perfectly formed pieces together according to Bernhard's instructions and it's a perfect fit! Nice and tight but still moveable!!!

So back to the puzzle!
George Syriaque is a prolific collector of puzzles and has recently started to design his own. This 6 piece burr is his first design and it's a cracker. This was another one of the puzzles I bought from Bernhard Schweitzer. It was available in either 3 different colour woods or as a single colour made from Robinia (pseudoacacia). I chose the latter because I think it is always such a beautiful looking wood with a lovely deep colour and great grain; also being only 1 colour will add to the difficulty. I left it for a couple of weeks to allow my feeble brain to forget the reassembly I had just done and then worked on disassembling it. It took a fair while to work out which piece moves first - whilst it is called By George Burr, and looks a normal 6 piece burr shape, it is not actually a burr puzzle! It is an interlocking solid. It is not immediately obvious which piece moves and which direction either - for an awful moment I thought I had actually stuck it together with the glue!!! Eventually I found the "sweet spot" and Thwack! it slides apart! After this it is a nice series of discoveries to take the next 2 pieces out. You are then left with a nice simple construction of three parts which can slide on each other but don't seem to come apart - Burrtools is no use to you with this one! Rotations are required. Being a bit thick, it took me about 20 minutes to get the final disassembly! It is disassembly level 2.4.3.2.3. You end up with these pieces:

By George! Burr in pieces again (6 of them!)

It is a beautifully made puzzle and is unexpectedly difficult but not too awful. For a seasoned puzzler you might attempt to start from the disassembled state! Berhard may have a few left!

The next puzzle in that delivery is one that you cannot get at the moment. It is the Diagonal Loop 1 cube by Thai Pham:

Diagonal Loop 1

This puzzle was a very generous gift from Bernhard for helping him with a little translation work he needed. This is a prototype which may yet be produced in greater numbers. I think it has been made from Maple and Walnut. It doesn't show all the usual hallmarks of Bernhard's perfect work - there are no chamfered edges, the alignment is out by a tiny tiny amount and the fit is very very tight. But I have to say that I love this puzzle!!! It is level 1.2.4 and requires rotations.

The first piece comes out pretty quickly and is quickly followed by the next! At this point there is one move that easily occurs and bang! No further! The final 3 pieces come apart with a very carefully aligned series of coordinated rotation moves - it is beautiful when you finally get it apart. In fact I was so delighted that I immediately sat back and forgot what I had done! You end up with these pieces:

Diagonal Loop 1 Pieces - see the loop?

I realised how stupid I had been in not paying attention and left it for about an hour before trying to reassemble it! It took me an hour to put it back together!! Working out what goes where is very easy but it is really hard to work out the exact sequence and alignment to actually make it happen.

I brought all my Puzzlewood puzzles to the Midlands Puzzle Party a few days later and whilst having a play, Ali had it fall apart in his hands (he was absolutely mortified!). In a way it was good for me because he was able to give me proper advice on how to glue puzzles together! Previously I had risked life and skin using Superglue but now I am fully equipped. Thanks Ali!!!

If this puzzle ever comes available from any of the fine wood craftsmen out there then just say yes! It is is just brilliant. Having done it many times, it still taxes me when I try to do it again!!

So in Elvis' words:
Treat me nice
Treat me good
Treat me like you really should
Cause I'm not made of wood
but
even if you are made of wood then please do the same!!!
And you wondered where the hell I was going with it!! :-D

Is Wood Puzzling?

Recent Puzzlewood Delivery

Is wood puzzling?? Of course it is!

Puzzlewood is a brilliant site run by the fantastic puzzle collector and puzzle craftsman, Bernhard Schweitzer. He manufactures some wonderful puzzles for various people to exchange at the yearly International Puzzle Party and afterwards puts them (and some others he finds or makes) up for sale. Recently he announced the availability of another batch and being my usual indecisive self I couldn't choose which to have so I bought them all! Luckily his prices are very reasonable - although the present Mrs S may not agree when she noticed quite how many puzzles I had bought over the last 3 months!!!

A few weeks ago I received this first batch from him - Yes!!! there are more coming!

Burrtastic & an apology!

First of all, let me please apologise to you all for not having posted for a while! I haven't lost interest (blog-fade), but I have been very busy at work and the present Mrs S has gotten rather worn out by constantly having to open the door to the postman to accept puzzle deliveries! At one point she fired up the laser stare and burnt me very badly!! So much so that I couldn't type (and even went temporarily deaf - I'm obviously wired up wrong!!) - this has meant that I have had to read about puzzles, play with puzzles (ocasionally solving puzzles), buy puzzles, photograph puzzles but I haven't dared actually sit down in front of the computer to write about puzzles!!! You can tell from this paragraph why she might have been a very teeny tiny touch miffed at me????

I've promised to improve my ways (and to do some DIY around the house!) and in exchange she will let me carry on my puzzle obsession! Oh yes, and she's out just now so I can write a blog post too! Let me know if you hear her coming back soon!!! I did figure that with the huge swathe of blog posts coming from Rox, Neil, Allard, Scott, Jerry, Jeff and Brian (forgive me if I forgot anyone!!) all about exciting occurrences and puzzles discovered at the IPP then you might forgive me my small lapse!

Over the last 2 years, I initially became known for being a bit of a savant for the wire puzzles and whilst I do enjoy these (especially those by Dick Hess), they are never attractive enough to leave on display - PLUS they jingle, which puts my life at risk from Mrs S! More recently I have ventured into twisties because there is so much variety and they are so logical - all that is required is to use a few techniques and gradually you can expand them to solve almost any new puzzle - PLUS they are relatively cheap. Again, however, they are not attractive!!

I have an absolute love affair (please don't tell her!) with beautiful wooden interlocking puzzles - both burrs and cubes! They look fabulous on display and can have a real "Aha!" moment! Some can be incredibly difficult as well as beautiful - see my review here. So here we go! I think I will introduce a few new puzzles of this type that I have acquired recently.

Piston Burr

Houston! I have a problem!!

Iwahiro cylinder - firmly shut!

I am truly terrible at opening the aluminium puzzles from Wil Strijbos! It took me weeks to open the cylinders. I spent 2 months on the Opening bat from Mr Puzzle. Maybe I shouldn't have bought the Alcyl designed by Iwahiro because on arrival it was almost open and I quickly just tightened it shut and now cannot open it at all! Absolutely no movement whatsoever!!!

In my desperation! Look what I did:

Vertical view

Horizontal view

The problem? Even with these Xrays, I still can't open the damn thing!! Maybe I need to stop puzzling!!!

Hanayama Cast Square

Cast Square

Today it's time for a review of another from my last rather extensive Puzzle Master delivery! This time it is yet another of the Hanayama Cast Puzzles the Cast Square. I chose this one because being really shiny, it appealed to my inner Magpie again and also because it had been rated as a maximum difficulty - a level 6 on the Hanayama scale! Or level 10 (Mind Boggling) on the Puzzle Master scale. At maximum difficulty, I thought this would keep me going for quite some time! It was designed by Finland's Vesa Timonen who is very prolific and has designed several of my previous puzzles - see here and here.

As with all of these puzzles it arrived absolutely beautifully packaged with just the instructions to take it apart and reassemble it. Cryptically it said that putting it back together in a different way leads to a different disassembly strategy being required. This was another feature which appealed to me - more than one puzzle in a single package. It consists of 4 pieces of metal interestingly interlocked, 2 are silver chrome and 2 are gold. The only downside (as you can see from my photo is that fingerprints and dust seem to easily mark the surface. Together it makes a very attractive shape (even Mrs S admitted that), dimensions are 4.8 x 4.8 x 1.3 cm and it is a pretty decent weight. No solution is provided and as I will tell later, you WILL solve it but not in the way intended so I seriously suggest downloading the solution from here. I found it gave me a real insight into the idea behind the puzzle.

Previous reviews can be found by Brian on his blog and by Gabriel on his.

Keyhole

Keyhole

In the midst of all the wonderful coverage of the goings on at the last International Puzzle Party (IPP32) in Washington DC by my fellow bloggers I have hesitated to post a mundane puzzle review. Especially as I can't make it a positive one!

Amongst my last hoard of puzzles (a term I have taken to using to describe the suitcases of my friends who went to the IPP) from Puzzle Master, I received a wire and string puzzle called Keyhole. I got this one because I had decided that it might be a good idea to try my hand at some of the more complex wire puzzles to give myself a bit of a challenge. This one is indeed at the top of their scale at 10 out of 10 (Mind Boggling). Plus with the apparent simplicity of it, I thought it would be a pleasant solve process. Made of wire, sturdy string and painted wooden baubles it measures 12 x 4.9 x 2.5 cm and is a nice tactile puzzle to hold and play with. No solution is included but one can be downloaded from here.

Nickel Box

Nickel Box

In honour of the recently concluded 32nd International Puzzle Party in Washington DC I thought I should review a puzzle that is significantly more than just ordinary. One day I hope that I might be invited to join the great and the good in the puzzling world at an IPP and to show that I am a serious collector of "beautiful and tough puzzles", I introduce the Nickel Box!

Quite a few blind ends!

I have been playing with this on and off for a couple of weeks and have solved it today (at least half solved it). I bought this from the Arteludes webstore. This is a french-based site run by Jean-Baptiste Jacquin which I was able to browse easily courtesy of the built in translation from the Chrome browser (my French is pretty poor)!! For international customers you need to contact Jean-Baptiste himself and he is very helpful. The puzzles on this site are beautiful and most (if not all) have been crafted by the superb Maurice Vigouroux (my copy of the incredibly tough 150 move 18 piece burr, the Tiros, was made by him and is available on the site too - Allard reviewed Tiros here). I couldn't resist it and bought it and another puzzle at the same time!

This puzzle was initially designed by Donald Osselaer and Stephane Chomine added the ornamentation to make it harder. Limited to only 20 copies, it is a caged burr measuring 7.5cm on each axis and is surprisingly heavy (400g) due to the use of Ebony as its main component. The burr pieces are made of Purpleheart in my copy but it is also available as Padauk. The burrs are carved from a single piece of wood with no gluing used at all. The embellishments to the burr pieces and box are made from Beech. Even the present Mrs S (doing ok for a first wife!) immediately said that it was stunning and actually allowed it to sit on the coffee table in the living room for a few days before returning it to my study - this is a major feat for her!!

Hanayama Cast Amour

Cast Amour

Whilst we all sit and wait for news of lovely new toys to come out from the 32nd International Puzzle Party (IPP) in Washington being held just now, I thought I might try and distract you all with "tales of lurve"!!! Yep here we have a heart with what looks like a couple of tails! This is the Cast Amour from Hanayama.

There is also another Tale of Lurve here too! Whilst the present Mrs S has no interest in playing with this (or any other) puzzle, she has agreed in principle that I can go to an IPP in the future (wherever it may be) - how about that for real lurve??? I am too late to go to the current Washington one but hopefully I will get to the next (in Asia somewhere) or the following one in Europe. Now all I need is an invitation. If any of you IPPers out there happen to read my blog - how about it? I quite clearly have a good collection, I even more clearly have a "passion for puzzles"! Do I deserve an invitation to this most prestigious of puzzling events?

I received mine from Puzzle Master as part of their huge selection of Hanayama puzzles. It is rated as 5 out of 6 in the Hanayama difficulty scale or 9 (Gruelling) on the 6 to 10 scale used by Puzzle Master themselves. I personally think it may well be slightly easier than that but others have agreed with the rating. This puzzle was designed by the great Akio Yamamoto and consists of a golden coloured metal male and female symbol intertwined within/through a flattened disk which I initially thought was a heart shape but which the puzzle instructions insists is the shape of the "forbidden fruit". It is 5.2 x 5.2 x 3.1cm and is really shiny and catches my "magpie" eyes very nicely.

This one has been reviewed by Brian here (his only complaint was that the shape doesn't sit straight on a table!), by Gabriel here and Oli on his blog here. The reviews on the Puzzle Master product page for this one were all positive. All of this did make me quite keen to try this one. No solution is provided but you can obtain one here.