No Problem Puzzles, Update #2

No Problem Puzzles provided over 100 amazing puzzles designs for the community between November 2020 and April 2023 until the tragic passing of Symen Hovinga on 7 April 2023.  Theo Geerinck, the other half of the No Problem Puzzles duo, decided to graciously allow the puzzle designs to be made available to the puzzle community for anyone to print their own copy to keep the legacy alive.  Mr BurrTools himself, Andreas Röver, is currently in the process of verifying and publishing the stl model files over the next several months.  These are being made available on the Printables site under the No Problem Puzzles collection. 

Since the last review (Preserving a Legacy – No Problem Puzzles {https://www.zenpuzzler.com/2025/06/preserving-legacy-no-problem-puzzles.html}), the next 4 No Problem Puzzles have become available.  They consist of Unmatch Box, Turn Around, Quinta Cuboids, and Dizygotic.  For this batch of puzzles, each had a different specified level of difficulty.  On a scale of 5, there was a 1.5, 2, 3, and 4.

Turn Around

Turn Around has the highest level of difficulty of the puzzles that have been provided on Printables so far.  It is a level 4 puzzle and provides a very nice challenge.

The objective of Turn Around is to pack 6 pieces within a box.  The bottom of the box has an internal 3x4x2 void and the top has a 3x4x1 void.  Unfortunately, the top needs to be screwed on with a 45 degree turn that is impeded by the pieces.  However, it works just great without the pieces.

You quickly realize that there is no trivial solution where some pieces fit exactly in the top space and some in the bottom space so that they don’t cross the boundary and interfere with the rotation.  Fortunately, the pieces don’t completely fill the interior of the box and you can utilize the voids to accomplish the rotation of the top.  Or maybe I should say, you can try to utilize the voids to do the rotation.

Needless to say, I fixated on an approach to accomplish the rotations that turned out to be wrong.  However, once I abandoned that approach, I quickly latched on to the proper solution.  

An alternate set of 6 pieces that can be packed within the box is also provided.  However, the alternate set of pieces is just that, an alternate set and not a second challenge.  Once you solve the puzzle, it’s solved regardless of which set of pieces you use.  I really can’t say if solving the puzzle is easier with one versus the other, but I found that the original pieces provided a good challenge.

I was a little surprised that the second set of pieces did not utilize my original approach.  Of course my original approach is the obvious first attack designed to sucker you in and keep you from discovering the much more elegant solution.

Unmatch Box

Oh so simple.  And Oh so difficult I found it.  I should have noted that this is an unmatch box and not a match box and shouldn’t have expected it to be easy to put things inside it.  Although this puzzle has a difficulty rating of 3, I spent more time solving it than Turn Around with a difficulty rating of 4.

Unmatch Box consists of 2 loops that can be arranged to make an enclosed box like shape and 3 pieces that need to be cached inside when closed.

In hindsight, it’s not difficult to solve but I struggled with it.  The pieces are very well chosen with lots of almost possibilities that kept me going around in circles, continuously, over several days, sans solution.

Packing any 2 of the pieces within the box is not an issue.  Trying to get that 3rd piece in is the challenge.  The problem is that the internal space starts to collapse when you open the box.  Trying to figure out how the pieces need to be arranged to support that collapse is the issue.  It teases you by allowing pieces to poke through gaps in the partially rotated box sides but never opens enough to allow them to completely pass through.

After a few days, I finally decided I was overcomplexerizing things and tried to dumb it down a bit.  Eventually, I stopped trying the same things and had everything packed within Unmatch Box.  As with many good puzzles, it took a long time to finally discover how simple it was.

Quinta Cuboids

The difficulty rating for Quinta Cuboids is 2 and I found this one a very quick solve.  It consists of 5 identical rectangular parallelapipeds (fancy speak for cuboids) that need to be packed within a restricted-opening box.  And the box only accepts the cuboids in one orientation.  And the solution obviously requires the cuboids to be in other orientations.  Which makes this a great 3D packing learning experience for someone just starting out with restricted-opening 3D packing puzzles.

Dizygotic

Dzygotic, at difficulty level 1.5, is another puzzle designed for packing puzzle beginners and I found this one a very quick solve.  It consists of 2 pieces that have to have to be packed within a restricted-opening box.  Unlike Quinta Cuboids, the pieces aren’t simple cuboids and the box sports 2 openings that occupy 3 sides.  The interior of the box is 3x3x2 and the pieces can fit within that space in several different ways and orientations.  The trick is to determine which one can be formed by introducing and manipulating the pieces using the restricted openings.  And yes, this is an apparent cuboid puzzle where all the openings are blocked by the pieces.



This is the second blog that continues reviewing the No Problem Puzzles as they are released on the Printables site under the No Problem Puzzles collection.  The first blog is Preserving a Legacy – No Problem Puzzles {https://www.zenpuzzler.com/2025/06/preserving-legacy-no-problem-puzzles.html}.