Hey everyone,

Today I'd like to show off my newest and first 3D printed design, the Hexoid.

VIDEO



This puzzle was designed by myself in SolidWorks, and printed at Shapeways. The stickers were cut by Oliver Nagy.



The Hexoid is a face turning hexagonal prism, deeper cut than the standard Hexagonal Prism, but not as deep as the Cheese. As a result, it has parts from both puzzles, creating an interesting puzzle to solve. The mechanism is actually designed to only have two layers, however a third layer was added, in a similar fashion to how I imagine the Puck Puzzle holds its pieces in.

Personally, I'm very happy with the results. Before printing it I made some stupid mistakes (parts were still in contact so I had to use a scalpel to cut them apart, and I didn't make the screw hole size correct so I had to fill it and drill a hole to repair it). So once I've sorted out those problems, plus a couple of other things to improve the overall quality, it should be a perfect puzzle. I would also like to thank Eric Vergo for helping me on the way with my first puzzle (and other puzzles for that matter). He has been a huge help with teaching me what I need to know. TomZ has also been great help on my quest to learn how to design puzzles.

My plan with the puzzle is to auction it off on eBay in a few weeks time, after I've taken it to the Rapidash Open 2012 with me. A few months after the auction has finished, I will release the puzzle on Shapeways.

And for Andreas, the puzzle is 57mm tall, with the shorter edge length being 40mm, and it is approximately 140g.



Hopefully this is only the start of my puzzle designing experience, and hopefully you like the puzzle!

Many thanks,

Luke

Finally Luke !! Good job, I really love it =)

Cheers mate

This is a really high quality, amazing start to your puzzle design and printing career. You've produced a fantastic puzzle on your first try .

Wow Luke, a speed cuber and a puzzle designer!

Very nice.

Wow Luke, the puzzle look's very nice, good job !

Congratulations! I must say that I am really impressed by the turning and sturdyness of this puzzle. The fact that its your first puzzle amaze me. Very well done!

I can't wait to see your next work!

I like it. Similar pentagonal prism would look nice as well.

A pentagonal version would be very similar to Oskar's Chilen Cube. The main differences are that the Chilen Cube has two layers as opposed to the Hexoid which has three; the Chilen Cube has been rotated 36 degrees within it's shape (the orientation of the cuts within the solid give the appearance that the puzzle is beyond deep cut); and also the cuts are curved.

Nice looking puzzle!!!
Nice plan.
Oh we like the puzzle and YES we hope to see many more designs from you.

Great work,
Carl

Really well done, Luke! If I ever get one (unlikely, but you never know), I'm going to do blue and white on the hexagonal faces to make it match the Israeli flag.

-Eitan

Oh wow! I love it!

By stickering each of the hex faces with six wedges of different colors, you could make the puzzle a bit harder, as it would differentiate the "hex prism edge" pieces like they are on the original prism.

Fantastic puzzle! The pattern on the two hexagonal faces is quite beautiful. Well done.

Very Nice. I like it.

That, Mister, is a puzzle equally fun to solve (I suppose/estimate) as well designed;
REALLY MUCH.
Awesome.

Very Imaginitive well done!!!

Really nice puzzle Luke! The pattern on the two hexagonal faces is particularly nice. I definitely think you should elaborate onto other prisms with this concept. Very well done!

Sweet first puzzle.

That's an amazing puzzle for a first design, and it works great too! I wish I could say the same about my first design...

Thank you. This helps a lot.
An even greater help are the edited images. Thank you for that too.

Great! I really like this puzzle because it is complicated, but not too hard to solve. Does the mechanism allow for mass-production? I'd really like to own this puzzle. Hope you keep designing!

As a new designer it's hard for me to say or know if it would be viable to be mass produced. Looking at what's being produced at the moment, I would say it is probably possible, although I'd imagine it would have to be a fair bit larger and possibly have parts screwed together (like on the 3x4x5 and Helicopter Dodecahedron). If anyone is willing to mass produce it, feel free to message me!


Well, you could always try to win the eBay auction, and if you can't then you can wait until it'll be released on Shapeways.

Thanks for the compliments guys! I already know what I'm going to be printing next, and I'm sure you'll all enjoy it...

When designing this puzzle, Eric had a similar idea, although he suggested making it a 'Multi' style puzzle, with holes in the centre pieces of the rectangular faces, and showing the internal pieces. Sadly though, the mechanism on the centre piece wouldn't allow a hole pass through the piece, due to the piece's mechanism being rather slim.



I may be able to try a similar idea on a two layered version of the puzzle though. If anyone would be interested in a Multi style version of this puzzle, feel free to message me.