Hangers

Hangers is a 2D Symmetry puzzle developed by Master Symmetrist Alexander Magyarics.  It consists of 3 polyominoes that form a symmetric shape.  But the type of symmetry is not specified.

I find 3 piece symmetry puzzles fall into that sweet spot in terms of level of difficulty.  They immediately look near impossible when they consist of 4 or more pieces due to the exponential increase in piece location combinations.

Once again, I naively bought into the this puzzle looks easy feeling expecting a quick solve.  And as usual, it was anything but.  Even though I knew the obvious piece placements were a trap, it was hard to not to fall into them.  And fall into them I did, multiple times, thinking that there would be a difference.

Although I spent a lot of time just fiddling with the pieces, I eventually turned on some brain cells to speculate on the solution.  One arbitrarily firing brain cell provided the type of symmetry used while a couple of others produced the solution before passing out.

I really liked this one.  It survived a lot zoom meetings.  I find these puzzles perfect for these meetings since they lay flat, move easily, and don’t making clacking sounds next to the computer mic.

My copy of Hangers is 3D printed by Alexander but you can also get a laser-cut acrylic version from Nothing Yet Designs.

Hamstersaurus

Over a year ago, I reviewed an amazing 6-piece burr dissection designed by Steve Nicholls called Smelling Of Roses (New Puzzle Comes Out – Smelling Of Roses).  It appears that Steve has been at it again with another 6-piece burr dissection called Hamstersaurus, which was his International Puzzle Party (IPP) exchange puzzle at IPP42.  Steve has now graciously made it available for anyone to download the Hamstersaurus model files from MakerWorld to print their own copy.

Hamstersaurus is as fun as Smelling Of Roses.  This time around, Steve upped the ante and made the destination shape 2 intersecting pyramids instead of a single one.  Initially, it takes some effort to get oriented with how the pieces are used to form the final shape.  And once you get that down, there seems to be many ways that the pieces can be joined.  But eventually, all the pieces come together.  It’s not difficult but it is a fun challenge.  I’m looking forward to seeing the 6-piece burr dissection based on 3 intersecting pyramids.

Happy Anniversary! – The End Of Another ZenPuzzler Year

It’s the end of another ZenPuzzler year!  And a full year it was without missing a single week.  This year had a wide variety of puzzles made from a variety of materials.  A new reoccurring series of posts this year covered the No Problem Puzzles by Symen Hovinga and Theo Geerinck that are being released over time due to the loss of Symen.  If you have been keeping good track of the releases, you know that I am getting quite a bit behind in posting about them.

I’m also getting behind in everything, including posting, solving, and designing.  In an attempt to find a better balance, my plan is to spend less time blogging to dedicate more time to solving and designing.  Going forward, I expect the posts to be shorter and less frequent.  I’m sorry to have to disappoint my 4 readers.

As in prior years, I have created a list of the posts and the puzzles that are mentioned in those posts for this past year.  The name of each post is linked to the post entry so that you can easily jump to it by clicking on the name.  

29 APR 26 – Dark and Foreboding – ApocalypTIC

• ApocalypTIC by Richard Gain & Andrew Crowell

22 APR 26 – Venatio Formicarum – Ant Hunt

• Ant Hunt by Boaz Feldman

15 APR 26 – 3-Pronged Puzzling Approach – TritanIC Series (1-6)

• TritanIC by Andrew Crowell
• TritanIC 2 by Andrew Crowell
• TritanIC 3 by Andrew Crowell
• TritanIC 4 by Andrew Crowell
• TritanIC 5 by Andrew Crowell
• TritanIC 6 by Andrew Crowell

8 APR 26 – Stuffing Puzzles – Xmas Stocking

• Xmas Stocking by Osanori Yamamoto

1 APR 26 – April’s First Puzzle – Smelling of (M̶)Bums

• Smelling of (M̶)Bums

25 MAR 26 – Forever In the Rough – 10 of Diamonds

• 10 of Diamonds by László Molnár

18 MAR 26 – Getting Everything Back Together – HolisTIC

• HolisTIC by Andrew Crowell

11 MAR 26 – No Problem Puzzles, Update #8

• Chain Stitch by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Nineveh by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Quintessence by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Rhomble by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga

4 MAR 26 – Decadent – Triple Dip

• Triple Dip by George Sicherman 

26 FEB 26 – A Spirited Journey – Templars Cross

• Templars Cross by Andrew Crowell

18 FEB 26 – Oh! – Fudge

• Fudge by Takuro Kawasaki

11 FEB 26 – Magical Slant On Puzzling – Diagonal Twins

• Diagonal Twins by Yasuhiro Hashimoto

4 FEB 26 – Little Nightmares – Six Face

• Six Face by Andrew Crowell

28 JAN 26 – No Problem Puzzles, Update #7

• Squeezy by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• I Box by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Mecon by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Multiplex by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga

21 JAN 26 – King Of Red Herrings – Neptune

• Neptune by Osanori Yamamoto

14 JAN 26 – Missing The Point – Aztec Pyramid Of The Sun

• Aztec Pyramid Of The Sun by iDventure 

7 JAN 26 – Tubular Boxification – Tube It In 2

• Tube It In 2 by William Hu

31 Dec 25 – Holiday Puzzling – Christmas Advent Calendar

24 Dec 25 – No Problem Puzzles, Update #6 

• 3OPc by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Pyre by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• 7 Spiders by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Hexatanglers by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Jigsaw Box by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga17 Dec 25 – 

14 Dec 25 – Crafty Sunflower – Release #2

• Flower Coaster by Serhiy Grabarchuk
• Checkered Chairs by Serhiy Grabarchuk
• 12 Logs by Serhiy Grabarchuk

10 Dec 25 – Life, The Universe, And Everything – 42

• 42 by Joe Turner

3 Dec 25 – Better Than TV – Widescreen

• Widescreen by Alexander Magyarics

26 Nov 25 – Avoiding The Dangers Of Wood – Splinter 12

• Splinter 12 by Nan Ma

19 Nov 25 – Merlon the Magician Apparently Fortified – Embrasures 

• Embrasures by Alexander Magyarics

12 Nov 25 – No Problem Puzzles, Update #5

• Push-Pull by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Hash^3 by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Trio, White Cat by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Pakze! by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• T On Top by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga

5 Nov 25 – Cranial Conundrum – Skull Puzzle

• Skull Puzzle by DaveMakesStuff

29 Oct 25 – Plastic Picnic Plates – Three Plates Burr

• Three Plates Burr by mad gardener

22 Oct 25 – Oh! – Omicron

• Omicron by Girish Sharma

15 Oct 25 – Round Bevels – Petit Albert

• Petit Albert by Volker Latussek

8 Oct 25 – Two Lips Are Better Than One – Tulip 1

• Tulip 1 by Osanori Yamamoto

1 Oct 25 – No Problem Puzzles, Update #4

• Black Cat, White Cat by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Pizza Panne by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Donut Perplex Junior by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Twist Them In by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga

24 Sep 25 – 2-Maze Challenges, Double – CrossRoad

• CrossRoad designed by Brian Kren

17 Sep 25 – Puzzle or Just Puzzley? – Treasure Box

• Treasure Box by ROKR

10 Sep 25 – The Case Of The Perplexing Orange Spaghetti – Orange Perplex

• Orange Perplex by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga

3 Sep 25 – Flattenry Will Get You Nowhere – Soma Tray

• Soma Tray by Rick Eason

27 Aug 25 – No Problem Puzzles, Update #3

• Boon by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Sliding Doors by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Pivot Window by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Orange Perplex by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Salmiak by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Vixen’s Antlers by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga

20 Aug 25 – No Force Required – Gentle Interlock

• Gentle Interlock by Junichi Yananose

13 Aug 25 – In Mint Condition – Dr. Bell's Curiously Warped Mints

• Dr. Bell's Curiously Warped Mints by George Bell

6 Aug 25 – A Solid Challenge? – NotchedTIC

• NotchedTIC by Andrew Crowell

30 Jul 25 – Mixolometragrobology – Get in the Spirit!

• Get in the Spirit! by Steve Canfield & Lee Krasnow

23 Jul 25 – Monumental – Markus’ Tetrahedron

• Markus’ Tetrahedron by Markus Götz

16 Jul 25 – No Problem Puzzles, Update #2

• Turn Around by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Unmatch Box by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Quinta Cuboids by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Dizygotic by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga

9 Jul 25 – Engage! – Clutch 4

• Clutch 4 by Girish Sharma

2 Jul 25 – F In L – Eleven L’s Puzzle

• Eleven L’s Puzzle

25 Jun 25 – Preserving a Legacy – No Problem Puzzles

• Sandbox by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• Swinging Lid Tray by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga
• U2 Frame by Theo Geerinck & Symen Hovinga

18 Jun 25 – Amazingly Non-Burrish – Gravitational Burr

• Gravitational Burr by Junichi Yananose

11 Jun 25 – More PPing in the Big Apple – NYPP 2025

4 Jun 25 – Welcome To The Home Of Despair – DODECASOMA

• DODECASOMA by Rod Bogart

28 May 25 – Crafty Sunflower Release: May 2025

• Plank Box by Serhiy Grabarchuk
• Octamion by Serhiy Grabarchuk
• Correct Order by Serhiy Grabarchuk

21 May 25 – Surprise! – Birthday Cake

• Birthday Cake by iDventure

Dark and Foreboding – ApocalypTIC

It’s dark.  It’s foreboding.  In fact, it’s downright ApocalypTIC.

Back in the dark ages when the scourge of DIY 3D printing was just getting started, Richard Gain embarked on creating Printable Interlocking Puzzles (PIP).  These were interlocking puzzles where the pieces could be printed without supports or assembly of sub-components.  At some point, his level 11 PIP #4 was used as the seed of destruction for Andrew Crowell’s phenomenal Turboencabulator that stripped the PIP restrictions and brought a new level 17 challenge to life.

ApocalypTIC is a 5x5x5 Turning Interlocking Cube (TIC) consisting of 6 pieces.  Since it was TIC’led (not pink obviously) by Andrew, we know that it is going to be challenging.  

The first challenge is to find the assembly.  This is not as easy as most TICs since it lacks a large frame piece to use as a starting point.  In fact, each piece occupies no more than 3 layers with most of them only occupying 2.

Although some piece relationships seem obvious, there also seems to be many ways to create sub-assemblies.  And manipulating those sub-assemblies is a bit fiddly until you manage to get enough pieces to hold each other accountable.

At some point in the process, an assembly materialized from attempts at interweaving the pieces.  Swapping pieces in and out converged on a nicely morphing assembly of 4 pieces.  All that was needed was to determine how to get the, hopefully last 2 pieces, inserted.

I spent a lot of time on those last 2 pieces.  It got to the point where I could add either of them but not both at the same time.  After a lot of back and forth, I finally managed to confirm that these were indeed the final 2 pieces to go in and everything came together into a cube.

For a TIC, there are not a lot of rotations but the movements are well done and make a nice challenge.

Venatio Formicarum – Ant Hunt

It’s that time of year again where ants start showing up in the house.  It happens every year and I’m longer surprised, especially since I haven’t done anything different with the house that would lead me believe that this year would be any different.  So just like every prior year, I was left to hunt them down.

As I was on my ant hunt, it dawned on me that I had an International Puzzle Party (IPP) exchange puzzle from 2024 that I hadn’t solved yet.  Straining my brain a bit, I came up with the name: Ant Hunt.  I started playing with it in 2024 but didn’t completely solve it.  I succeeded in getting to what I assumed was the half-way point but didn’t succeed in completely solving it.  Instead of leaving it in a half-solved state, I reset it back to the beginning and put it on a shelf where it has resided unsolved until now.

Ant Hunt is a puzzle lock developed by Boaz Feldman and used as his exchange puzzle at IPP41.  The puzzle consists of a padlock with a key chained to the lock.  The padlock sports a couple of additional holes that you would not normally find on a lock not infested with ants.  It also comes with a nice information card outlining the goal to open the lock and free the ant as well as the taunt that even a chimp can fish ants out of holes with tools.

Well versed in the comings and goings of ants, I knew that working over a tray would be the smart thing to do.  And it was definitely confirmed during the solving process.

The lock arrives with the key on a chain that also runs through the locks shackle.  The key cannot be placed within the keyhole attached to the shackle in the way that it arrives.  The first step is to free the key.  This is really a gimme but there are stories of key holders tripping up lock solves.  My apologies to anyone out there refusing to ask for a hint and still trying to use the key still attached to the shackle.  And yes, once the key has been liberated, it does fit in the keyhole and turns as well.  It supports a 90 degree turn and you can get some idea of what is happening by peeking in the holes.

On my initial attempt in 2024, I took a clue from the supplied material and tried a simian approach and monkeyed around with the lock.  I used my patented Remove Ants In Detention process of inserting, outserting, twisting, tilting, rotating, and any number of other random techniques to give me some hints of how, what I assumed was the ant, traversed the metallic forest.  Eventually, the ant escaped the jailous lock and showed up on the tray.

At this point, even though I ant’d up, the lock was still securely closed.  Not having time to complete the solve, I managed to get the ant reincarcerated to live through another future solve from the beginning.  

For my recent attempt, I decided to spend some time and determine how the ant went about its business.  After some more monkeying around, I think I had a reasonable idea how the ant was getting around and invited him back out again to play.  This time, between the two of us, we then managed to go the final step and open the lock.  Not only does the lock open but the shackle is removable and you can see first hand what you had already assumed in order to solve it.

Ant to conclude, I was wrong.  So very wrong!   The puzzle was wronged!  This whole description was wrong!  Well at least some of it was wrong.  I almost missed it.  I made a bad assumption and almost failed to completely solve the puzzle.  There was one more thing to do!  NOW I believe that I have completely solved the puzzle.  I could have easily walked away thinking I had solved it before reaching the final stage.  So if your solve matches my description above, you’re not quite done.

3-Pronged Puzzling Approach – TritanIC Series (1-6)

A short while ago, just over 5 years, I reviewed a set of 3-piece 4x4x4 Turning Interlocking Cubes (TICs) designed by Andrew Crowell (Puzzle Candy - ThreeTIC, TriadTIC, TripleTIC, NeuroTIC, TriumviraTIC).  These TICs provided quick enjoyable solves to brighten the day.  Recently, a kind soul on the Mechanical Puzzle Discord (MPD) passed on another set of Andrew’s 3-piece TICs that I was more than happy to accept, but this time a 5x5x5 format.

The 6 TritanIC puzzles were designed by Andrew Crowell and like the prior 3-piece TICs, they provide a quick shot of TIC adrenaline to help get through the day.  I managed to hold myself back and do 1 a day over 6 days instead of binging them all in one sitting.
  

TritanIC

TritanIC, which I assume is the first of the series since it lacks a posterior numerical designator, is a nice start to ease you into the series.  One piece has more volume than the other 2 proclaiming itself as the base for adding the other 2 pieces.  The solution requires 1 straight forward rotation.  At least one other nice rotation is possible but not required and it made me wonder if it would be possible to alter the design to require it. 

TritanIC 2

I found TritanIC 2 to be twice as hard and then some as TritanIC.  I took this as a good sign that we were on a good trajectory.  TritanIC 2 has everything you would want in a 3-piece TIC where pieces have to added in orientations far from where they need to end up.  Determining how to simply put the 2 largest pieces together is not a gimme and takes some thought.  And trying to add the smallest piece to the mix is a challenge.

TritanIC 3

TritanIC 3 is a nice follow-up to TritanIC 2.  There are some nice rotations that have to be navigated to get the pieces in place before they collapse into a cube.  And you are almost guaranteed to have to back up and rethink the ordering of the pieces.

TritanIC 4

This is where the trajectory falls apart.  I found this one to be extremely easier.  Less than 2 minutes easy.  If you acquire the series, you may want to start with this one.  The most difficult part is getting the first 2 pieces together, which isn’t that difficult.  The third piece just flops in place before it it closed.  This one didn’t stand up compared to the others in the series.

TritanIC 5

TritanIC 5 gets things back on track.  In fact, it reminded me a lot of TritanIC 3 in terms of approach, rotations, and how the pieces go together.  It’s certainly it’s own puzzle, but has the same overall feel as TritanIC 3.

TritanIC 6

I found TritanIC 6 to be a tricky bugger.  Multiple rotations are required to get the pieces into position before they can start moving into place.  In fact, a few days later, it was non-trivial to determine how the pieces came apart.  A nice way to end the series!

Stuffing Puzzles – Xmas Stocking

I’ve seen references to the Xmas Stocking puzzle recently that caused my mind to wander a bit.  Since all the pieces were identical and packed in a fairly small box, I was wondering if I could solve it without having the puzzle.  After several minutes of determining how the pieces would need to be oriented due to the opening and rotation restrictions, I was able to visualize some assemblies but not how the pieces could be placed in the box.  I eventually resorted to using a piece of paper to map out the possible assemblies with no further luck.  It’s possible that this is one of those puzzles that requires some assistance like larger tolerances or beveling.  I was about to move on when I remembered that I had received some LEGOized hand-me-down puzzles from a generous soul on the Mechanical Puzzle Discord (MPD) server and sure enough, there it was.

Xmas Stocking is a 3D restricted-opening packing puzzle designed by Osanori Yamamoto.  It consists of 5 identical Z tetracubes that have to be placed in a 2x3x4 box with 2.5 voxels on the top closed off.  The triangular half-square is there to restrict pieces from moving through that square while forcing the voxel underneath to be occupied – assuming that the opening needs to appear completely filled.  I was unable to find verification of that requirement, but these types of puzzles seem to require that and it turned out to be the case for this puzzle.

Most of the 3D LEGO packing puzzles that I recently received came solved.  However, since they are made from LEGO bricks, you can simply rip off the bottom and dump the pieces without seeing how they are arranged or how they come out.   The LEGO bricks used to make the box also included portholes to view the interior of the box, but they are not needed to solve the puzzle.  

Being made from LEGO bricks, you know that there are no rotations that can occur with loose tolerances or bevels unless very specific pieces are used or they are doctored in some way.  Armed with that assumption, I tested the pieces and could get no further than my pencil and paper analysis.  Yes, of course I realized that I was operating with a bad assumption somewhere but was having a difficult time identifying what it was.  And then I dropped a single piece in the box and it bounced it’s way into an orientation that I had thought was impossible.  Apparently, the Z tetracube has a nice property that gives it a possible rotation that I had not thought of.  Now that the secret was out, it only took a couple of minutes to get all 5 Z tetracubes nestled within the box.

I don’t know if it was intentional, but the LEGO version did have the interesting property of still being apparently filled even with all those holes.

Mail Call

April’s First Puzzle – Smelling of (M̶)Bums

Spring has sprung and the backyard is once again filled with the sounds of crows screaming Ka-Ka all day long.  All this cacaphony tilted my brain, dumping future puzzle ideas into the cesspool of my mind where thoughts of the recent rash of geometric dissection puzzles started to float to the top. 

Last year, one of the 2 brass monkeys dropped a puzzle on the community (New Puzzle Comes Out – Smelling Of Roses)  that is now developing into a series.  My goal was to develop the second of those droppings.  And a solid #2 at that. 

We all spend too much time running around to no avail.  So I wanted to design a puzzle where you could avoid the runs, take a sit, and solve a puzzle.  A puzzle for everyone.  Even the naysayers who proclaim: Puzzles?  We don’t need no stinkin puzzles! 

I decided that I had to bring this puzzle to life.  It’s my duty!

Design

Sometimes I have puzzle ideas up the wazoo, sometimes I have to work at it, and sometimes both.  I put myself under a lot of pressure to come up with this design but initially nothing was emerging.  Then, when I was sitting on my porcelain thinking chair straining to bring to light a brilliant puzzle idea, it just materialized out of nowhere.  What a relief!

To start the design process, I took one of my cubic dissection puzzle designs and decided to muck around with it.  I decided it needed to have a crapazoid shape resulting from a crapazoidal projection of a diminishing cylinder in a polar coordinate system.  It turns out that crapazoidal math is exceedingly complex and it’s very difficult to determine the feci of the curves.  But I persevered and created the optimum crapazoidal dissection.  It’s always nice to have another design in the can!  According to the Hordern-Dalgety puzzle taxonomy, it’s classified as an ASS puzzle.  

I did a data dump on it and it turns out to be a level 5.5.3.3.3.3 with 4 of those movements being rotational.  It’s certainly not one of those boring watered down NM-ary challenges. 

I originally decided to name it Smelling of Mums along the series theme but that M eventually evolved into a B.

Testing

Once I had the initial design, I went through several prototypes.  Halfway through the design process, I had a brain fart and lost my momentum.  The first 2 versions were complete failures but the turd one was a success.  The most difficult part was determining the oder of the pieces to be added to the assembly. 

Piece of Crap

Production 

Now it was time to get down to business.  I was originally planing to make it out of coprolite but using FDM where everything gets built from the bottom was much cheaper.  I also elected to go with a single color to avoid overtaxing the poop chute.

Unfortunately, Smelling of (M̶)Bums is a PITA to make and production is limited. I can only make one a day and sometimes the assembly line backs up.  Eventually, I got in the groove and I had the runs coming out like clockwork. 

Sales

I didn’t think that there would be any interest in such a complex puzzle but puzzlers are descending on this one like a business of flies as if it’s their duty.  I design great puzzles and people tell me: That looks fantastic but I’m not buying puzzles right now.  I make a piece of crap and I get: That puzzle looks like it stinks.  I’ll take 2 please!
 

Distribution

When you’re dealing with piles of puzzles or vice versa, you need to settle on a shitting service to get them in the hands of puzzlers. They’re all shippy, but you need some means of leaving little packages in front of houses.  Hopefully customs won’t require retaining a duty.  At least I don’t have to worry about them getting damaged along the way since they’re very turdy.
 

Conclusion

In the end, I was happy to create the puzzle.  It is comprised of several awesome movements and tolerances are dead on.  Everything slides nicely, slick as … what you’d expect.  Although I was initially worried about the theme, I was given some good advice a long time ago – Make your business, Your business!  After all these decades, I finally get it. 

Although I always try to make puzzles that look like something you want to have in your hands, this one may not be that puzzle.  It also turned out that it wasn’t the puzzle to entice my NPSO.  She reminded me once again that she won’t take any crap from me.

It may be a while before my next puzzle. I’m all pooped out. 

  

Uh Oh!

 

Forever In the Rough – 10 of Diamonds

It’s sad when you realize that you are not playing with a full deck.  In fact, my Molnár deck only has 2 cards, the Ace of Diamonds (Nothing Yet Designs Release: 13 January 2025, 12:00 PM EST) and the 10 of Diamonds.  Someday, I’d like to have a full Molnár deck or at least a royal flush.

10 of Diamonds was designed by László Molnár and used by Gergő Prémecz as his exchange puzzle at the 40th International Puzzle Party (IPP).  It is a 2D tray-packing puzzle made from red and white acrylic.  The 5 unique pieces each consist of 2 connected diamonds.   The front of the tray is designed to look like a playing card, the 10 of diamonds in fact, with a rectangular space to hold the diamonds.  It’s nicely made by Mr. Puzzle with the details inlaid in red on a white background.  The backside has a second challenge, where the pieces need to fit within a hexagonal area.  The backside also has the puzzle information etched on the tray.

A single-sided version made from wood was originally entered in the Nob Yoshigahara Puzzle Design Competition in 2020 where it won a Top 10 Vote Getter Award.  Now the puzzle has double the fun of the award-winning version.

Both sides of the tray are challenging.  Since neither side is fully packed you would think it would be easier but you would be mistaken.  There is quit a bit of unused space that makes it more difficult to determine where pieces need to go.  And although the backside has 2 solutions, the front side has a single solution.  You may find it rough.  It may take you forever.  But you’ll enjoy solving it.  At least that’s what I kept telling myself.

Along the way, you may encounter situations where the pieces can be crammed in by force but this would not be the solution and you should not be tempted to use force.  The puzzle has been designed so that all the pieces can be nicely placed with no force.

10 of Diamonds is a nice challenge and I’m looking forward to seeing how László completes the royal flush.

Getting Everything Back Together – HolisTIC

After the last 2 Andrew Crowell spirit-crushing Turning Interlocking Cubes (TICs) that I worked on, 6 Face (Little Nightmares – Six Face) and Templars Cross (A Spirited Journey – Templars Cross),  it’s nice to take a step back and do a little HolisTIC puzzling.

HolisTIC is a 5x5x5 TIC designed by TIC master Andrew Crowell.  It consists of 7 unique pieces entwined in TIC magic.  It’s amazing how Andrew can just crank out all these complex puzzles with his TIC-it-tron.  As it’s name might suggest, there is a square hole bored through the center of each axis making it appear like a well-known Stewart Coffin design.  But this ain’t no Wookey Hole.

Unlike the last 2 TICs I worked on, this one falls on the lighter side TICdom.  I found it very approachable and the solving process moved along smoothly without any major hangups.  Of course, there are the obligatory backup and insert pieces in a different order, but for the most part, the piece locations are easy to determine as well as the movements and rotations needed to get them there.  It’s obvious where each piece enters until you discover that it enters from the other side.  You may also find that the last piece that you need to insert has to be added first.  And then when you do that, you realize that it’s in the way of other pieces forcing you to continually update the order of adding pieces.

Along the way, there are several very nice rotations that play out during the solution to add to the fun.  Some don’t become obvious until the end when you have to rotate pieces out of the way.  I’ve assembled it several times to enjoy the movements along the solution path.  

HolisTIC is obviously a puzzle designed to make you feel better.  And I appreciated restoring some of that confidence lost on 6 Face and Templars Cross.

Andrew’s puzzles can be found on his online shop, ARC Puzzles.

No Problem Puzzles, Update #8

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.  Another contributor, Crab on Printables, has also tweaked some of the models to improve them.

This post continues the review of the No Problem Puzzles as the models are being released.  Since the last review (No Problem Puzzles, Update #7), more No Problem Puzzles have become available.

Chain Stitch

This was Theo Geerinck’s exchange puzzle at the 28th International Puzzle Party (IPP).  It consists of 6 planer pieces that somehow form a 3D shape.  But what is that 3D shape?  Since it’s designated as a level 2.5 puzzle, I decided to make it extra challenging by not looking at the final shape.  Which was extra challenging.  Too challenging in fact and I resorted to peeking at the photo of the final shape.   Even knowing what the final form looked like, it wasn’t trivial.  Unless you have a crochet background, I’d recommend looking at the photo.  It also comes with a stand.  And it’s big, really big, so big!    

Nineveh

There are several puzzles that involve packing 9 V tricubes into a 3x3x3 cube.  This one stands it on end.  The goal is place the 9 Vs in a stand that is only big enough to hold a 2x2x2 cube.  Of course, you have to do it in such a way that the pieces overhanging the sides do not fall down.  At a difficulty level of 3 it’s not super challenging.  This is helped by the fact that there are 7 solutions.  Then again, if you’re objective is to find all 7, it may prove to be a little more challenging.

 

Quintessence 

Who doesn’t like a good dodecahedron puzzle.  The objective of this one is to take 6 identical shell pieces, each configured with a different hook assembly, and make a dodecahedron with the hooks weaving around each other inside.  Doesn’t look so bad and with a difficulty level of 3, it should pop together quickly.  On second thought, maybe it’s a bit more involved.  Then again, after several interesting moves, it wasn’t that difficult to get together.  However, I have the nagging suspicion that I used a sketchy (off-axis) rotation.  I’m not considering this one done unless someone indicates that a sketchy rotation is required.

 

Rhomble

Here’s a puzzle that was skewed twice over.  Or is it thrice skewed over.  I wasn’t confident that I could immediately discern whether it was twice or thrice so I had to think about it for a bit.  In the end, I convinced myself that you lose a pair of squares for each skew performed and that Rhomble was a Soma cube that had been skewed 3 times.  This puzzle has a difficulty level of 2 and makes a nice little challenge to skew ya bwain a tad.


If you don’t have a 3D printer, you can obtain copies of these puzzles from Nothing Yet Designs based in the US or the PuzzleguyStore based in the EU.

Decadent – Triple Dip

What do you do when you go to make a symmetry puzzle from a highly symmetric shape cut into 10 congruent isosceles triangles and then lose one of the those triangles?  Well, if you’ve been at this for a while, you randomly glue the triangles up and hope nobody notices.  And just to be sure that no one catches on, you theme the whole thing on 3s – 3 triangles, 3 pieces, triple ...
 
Triple Dip, designed by symmetrologist George Sicherman, is a 2D symmetry puzzle consisting of 3 pieces, each consisting of 3 isosceles triangles.  All 9 triangles are identical and are one tenth of a decagon.  Most 2D symmetry puzzles are laser-cut or 3D printed but the Triple Dip puzzles offered in Wood Wonders last release are of the decadent variety, made from a selection of exotic woods.

I got the triple Triple Dip made from 3 different types of exotic woods.  The choices where 1, 3, or 9 different types of exotic woods.  Having each piece with the same 3 different types of woods seemed like the most mind-bending option.  We’re all used to symmetry puzzles in a single color.  9 different colors would start to shake things up a bit.  But having each piece made from the same 3 different woods starts to pull the brain out of whack as it tries to align the colors.  Already possessing a herniated brain, I simply enjoyed the swirling colors in my mind as I ceaselessly shuffled pieces in front of me. 

Triple Dip arrives in a nice drawstring pouch with the name of the puzzle lasered on the bag.  Of course, the object is to arrange the 3 pieces into a symmetric shape once you have stopped admiring the eye candy.

I’m always amazed with how non-straightforward solving 3-piece 2D symmetry puzzles are.  I just know that there is a mathematical approach to solving them but I haven’t cracked it yet.  It always looks so easy and I always end up spending way more time than I expected on solving them.  Needless to say, they are awesome and I have quite a few of them.  Perfect fidget puzzles and they travel nicely.

After working on Triple Dip for a while, I discovered that I could make a symmetric shape with just 2 of the pieces.  The third piece wasn’t really needed after all.  Pretty sneaky I thought as I put the puzzle on the solved pile where it sat all alone.

Missing the swirling colors in my mind, I took Triple Dip back out for another twirl.  I spun those bits around like there was no tomorrow until it looked like it was ready to take off.  It was then that I noticed something peculiar.  The left side looked kind of like the right side but reversed.  Checking to be sure that a mirror hadn’t slipped in during the frenzy, I concluded that I must have come across a 3-piece solution.  Undaunted, I quickly scrambled them back up and continued twirling them around with a big smile.  Pretty wood ...

If you want to dip into symmetry puzzles, Triple Dip is still available at Wood Wonders.  And you can choose between having the puzzle made from either 1, 3, or 9 species of exotic woods.

A Spirited Journey – Templars Cross

Templars Cross is as easy as Six Face (Little Nightmares – Six Face), the last Andrew Crowell Turning Interlocking Cube (TIC) that I did.  In other words, I found it difficult.  Six Face had a piece that just gave me problems.  Templars Cross gave me twins to deal with.  Beware the terrible twos(ome).  But let’s start at the beginning.

Templars Cross is a 5x5x5 TIC designed by Andrew Crowell.  The red outer shell encases a 3x3x3 white apparent cube.  Each side of the outer shell has 8 missing voxels basically giving you 6 red crosses on a white background.  Of the 6 pieces that comprise Templars Cross, 2 are mostly red and 4 are mostly white.

Creating the red outer shell is not difficult but adding the white pieces becomes progressively harder.  The first piece is a gimme with a gotcha.  However, the gotcha will be short-lived if you stumble across it.  That leaves 3 little pieces to go.  2 are all white and 1 has a single red cube.  And that single red cube will be your friend once you solve it.

You need to determine how to place the 3 white pieces to make a cube with the white pieces already in the frame.  And do it such that the single empty voxel is cached behind the red frame making the cube appear solid.  And do it so that the frame pieces can be put together.  Did I mention that those twins have to be rotated several times while all this is going on?

The twins are mirror images of each other and are the A and B Soma pieces.  One end of the A piece is red so that has to plug the missing spot in the frame.  Easy, right?  Not so much.  And with all those rotations going on, it gives you an extra opportunity to get the wrong end of the A piece sticking out.

It’s an effort to determine how the white pieces need to be oriented in the cube.  It’s a bigger effort to determine how the pieces need be oriented to get the cube apart.  It’s an even bigger effort to determine how to perform the rotations to go between the 2 orientations.  This is the part that I really struggled on.

After a couple of sessions with Templars Cross, I was beginning to understand the symbolic tie to martyrdom and sacrifice.  I finally decided to throw a Hail Mary and put the pieces in what I assumed was the starting configuration and closed it up.  The only thing to do now was to rotate the pieces until it was solved, taken back apart, or stuck.

Once the frame is closed and locked (yes, one of the pieces acts as a lock), the 2 halves of the frame only shift 1 voxel in either of 2 directions but not both.  It turns out that both are needed in the solution.  I was happy to discover that I had indeed correctly figured out the starting configuration and was able to perform the required rotations to achieve the solved state.  And I find it highly repeatable knowing how Rudolph needs to be oriented.

Oh! – Fudge

Were you are expecting a quick solve?  Fudge get about it.  Which brings us to the latest puzzle confection – Fudge.

Fudge is a 3D packing puzzle designed by Takuro Kawasaki.  It was entered in the Nob Yoshigahara Puzzle Design Competition at the 42nd International Puzzle Party (IPP) where it won a Top 10 Vote Getter award.

How difficult could it be?  4 simple identical pieces that have to be packed in a box with one side completely open except for 2 voxels on opposite sides of the box. Not only are the pieces identical but they are symmetric, reducing the number of orientations that you have to check.  You will eventually stop yourself from rotating the pieces completely around to see if it fits in better the other way.  Or grabbing another piece to see if it fits better.

The pieces work in pairs and tangle each other to lock them in place.  You’ll eventually convince yourself that they only go together in 2 configurations that I call the cuboid and the corner.  And you would be right.  Unless you were wrong.

Any combination of cuboids and corners can fit within the box but not all them can be removed.  Once under the 2 covered corners, nothing wants to let go.

You may try to solve it with nice simple crisp rectilinear movements but at some point you’re just going to have to fudge it, maybe even double fudge it so do it on a Sunday.  It’s not difficult but makes for a nice treat on the weekend. 

Magical Slant On Puzzling – Diagonal Twins

Diagonal Twins was designed byYasuhiro Hashimoto and entered in the Nob Yoshigahara Puzzle Design Competition at the 42nd International Puzzle Party (IPP) in Japan.  It won the Puzzlers’ Award (top puzzle selected by the attendees) as well as a Jury Honorable Mention Award (even the judges liked it).

Diagonal twins consists of 4 dicubes that need to be packed within a cubic box.  The box opening is just about a quarter of the box.  Normally it would be easy to put 4 dicubes in such a box in several ways but the dicubes have been altered to make 2 identical male (rails) and 2 identical female (alleys) dicubes.  All you have to do is match them to get a nice cube and then figure out how to get that cube within the box.  There is no more room for requirements. 

Except that the angle of the rails and alleys forces the pieces to be at 90 degrees to each other, which appears impossible to place within the box.  Somehow, each diagonal rail has to be magically transported within a diagonal alley.  However, with the box impeding your progress, you’re left wondering how to get through the walls.

You need to experiment and discover how to levitate a piece without touching it (wingardium leviosa – pronunciation counts apparently).  It’s even more challenging without the benefit of a wand.  With some practice, you can learn to do this when you’re in a tight spot – like a box – like a box with a constrained opening.

Although not difficult, the movements to solve the puzzle are magical indeed.  And if it takes you a while, don’t be a muggle and give up.  Keep going and discover the magic for yourself.

And once the puzzle is solved, removing the pieces from the box is as easy as spilling butterbeer from a leaky cauldron.  

Little Nightmares – Six Face

It seems that I’ve been on a Turning Interlocking Cube (TIC) hiatus.  Not sure how that happened, but I’m glad to have recently acquired some new Andrew Crowell gems in the 5x5x5 format.  The first one that I decided to tackle was Six Face.  Not Six Faces, Sixth Face, or Six’s Face but Six Face.  I could only assume that it would be a significant challenge and reveal itself as a little nightmare.  Needless to say, it took me longer than expected to solve.

Six Face was designed by Andrew Crowell and my version is 3D printed.  The puzzle is not a complete 5x5x5 cube but looks like a 3x3x3 cube with each face extended outward.  One of these faces is debossed with the name of the puzzle.  The face was carefully chosen so that the name was on a single piece to avoid providing any additional placement clues.  In total, there are 6 pieces that have to be assembled into the final shape.  It only takes 28 moves and there are a couple of rotations along the way.

I took Six Face and several other puzzles with me on vacation to PA, which is ironic since they were sent from PA by kind gentleman looking to spread the frustration.  And by frustration, I mean joy of course.  As always, I overestimated the number of puzzles that I would need.  I started with Six Face and almost ended there as well.  At least I was able to bring it home solved.  YES it was me that solved it!  I’m disappointed that you would even think otherwise.

Solving Six Face took me several sessions.  Right out of the bag, you need to spend 1 of your rotations to get the first 2 pieces together.  Or are they not the first 2 pieces?  Only time will tell.

With the 3 biggest pieces, you can construct most of the visible shape leaving you with the 3 smaller pieces that need to fill the gaps.  Of course, the order of entering those pieces and movements required are what make the puzzle challenging.  Two of the smaller pieces are dancing partners and work nicely to build out the solution path.  But it’s that last piece that is the crux of the solve.  For whatever reason, I had a huge blind spot concerning the where, when, and how of this piece.  It could obviously exist in 2 different orientations, so there were twice as many avenues to explore.  Adding it earlier would provide more room for it to navigate but of course would reduce the mobility of the other pieces.  And just how could that crux piece be added and manipulated into position.

I’m sure it will come as no surprise that a lot of steps were repeated looking for a new avenue to present itself.  With all this experimentation, it became apparent that the final orientation of the crux piece would be different from the orientation that it would enter the framework with regardless of which of the 2 possible orientations was the correct one.  You would think that knowing this, it would be easy to find an orientation where it could be inserted within the frame.  However, I found this a difficult challenge.

Eventually, I found a way to add the crux piece and rotate it into place.  So simple!  How could I have missed it?  All that was left was to determine how to add the dancing partners with it.  Not easy.  Nope.  Not happening.  And it didn’t happen, leaving me to wonder if it was just difficult or if I was barking up the wrong orientation.  At this point I had to split my time between working this approach as well as trying to find an approach for the other crux piece orientation.

Eventually 2, I found a way to add the crux piece in the other orientation and rotate it into place.  So simple!  How could I have missed it?  All that was left was to determine how to add the dancing partners with it.  At least this time, I was able to get everything in place and finally solve Six Face.

Fast forward several months to now when I want to blog about it and take it apart.  No surprises.  The crux piece volunteers to rotate and comes out nicely as expected.  Mission completed!  Except I can’t get it back together!  Try as I might, I just can’t find the exact insertion trajectory.  Unbelievable!  (You’d think by now that I would find this believable).  I spent at least another hour if not 2 getting it back together.  Not only that, I had to check both crux piece orientations since I didn’t pay attention to which one it was when taking it apart.  I’m assuming/hoping that if I take it apart again several months from now, it will be smooth sailing but at this point, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if it were a rough ride.

If you're interested in acquiring any of Andrew's puzzles, you can visit his online store ARC Puzzles.