Following on from Oskars recent posting regarding the Twist and Slide 2x2x2.

First of all I have to congratulate Oskar on yet another excellent puzzle.

I am posting this as I think some of you may be intersted.

Way back in March 1990 there was an article in the Dutch Cube Club newsletter CFF 23 pages 32 and 33 about a puzzle called Hypercube. This was a 3x3x3 with sliding pieces on each face which allowed normal cube twisting and the benefits of sliding the coloured tiles around, also moving pieces from one face to another.

At the time I thought one day I would try and make one of these. Needless to say it never happened but the thought was always there.

I remembed a few years ago a member on Twisty did a posting on one they had made, sorry can't find link, maybe another member could help here.
This prompted me to make one. Again nothing happened.

That is until last year. I decided that I WOULD make one and hopefully take it to the Cube Day in October 2009. I did start and was progressing well and on track for finishing by the time of the Cube Day but I had some other urgent commitments presented to me and I had to put it on hold. I did however take it to Holland but I did not take it to the Cube Day. I only showed it to Geert and discussed it with him, and pointed out a little problem I would have to overcome, a problem that would be very easily overcome. The puzzle has not progressed further since then, again due to other commitments.

I attach a photo of the puzzle as it stand at the moment for anyone that is interested.

Unlike Oskar's puzzle mine is totally handmade. Please excuse any finish quality as it has not been refined and cleaned up as yet. This is still to happen.

One day, dare I say this year, the puzzle will get finished.

[*]


Anthony

I can't wait to see this one finished! It has been my "dream puzzle" for years. Might have to download that photo and grab some man tools. It almost looks like I could do it.

I also had this idea about 20 years ago (late 1980's), but didn't pursue it because I realized the tiles could just slide off the puzzle half way through a rotation (which kind of defeats the point), if the tracks aren't deep enough. Interestingly this is not the case with a 2x2. I think I also found a really old patent which covers this idea (apparently I wasn't the first to come up with this idea either), but this must have expired by now...

This is why it wasn't ever finished before. There were solutions to it (making it deeper, of course) but it never got done.

I had a few ideas of my own, TBH.

Here's the patent I mentioned above. It was granted and published after I had the idea in the late 80's, but filed with an earlier priority date a couple of years before. This patent has certainly expired by now, and I doubt it was maintained for the full 20 years given that it was never commercialised.

It will be nice to see this idea finally made into reality. I just hope the tracks are deep enough so that the tiles can't slide off mid-rotation.

During making the puzzle last year I realised that the pieces would slide out when rotating a face. As you quite rightly say this somewhat defeats the object of the puzzle, apart from being 'slightly' annoying.
I soon found a way of overcoming this issue.

I still have to do some work to overcome the other problem I discovered/thought might be an issue when I begun. This is solvable, it just invloves a certain amount of work. This is the next step I will be getting on with when I return to it.

I was forwarded a copy of the patent last year after I had started the puzzle.

I would still like to see the previous posting from the memeber who did make one of these.


Anthony

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