I had a few spare hours this weekend so I made a Half Truncated Cube, like Wayne's:

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I started with cheap cubes from Walgreens (local drug store chain) that are the same as Meffert's (a key could be used to pop the face-centers). In my case I avoided the use of polyesther resin. Instead, I used a saw to take off the four edges - first, scoring the cut along each face, then cutting at an angle through the cube, through one edge piece at a time down to the common corner.

After the truncations were complete I took the cube apart and used Milliput to make caps for each face. First, put each cubie new-face down on a piece of wax paper. Then I took a small amount of Milliput, got it nice and wet, and jammed it into the piece "from behind" so that it filled down to the wax paper. After the putty hardened I removed the piece from the wax paper and sanded the new face, patching any big holes with another coat of Milliput.

Finally I sanded down the edges a bit to get the "cubie" look and then colored the white Milliput with a black Sharpie marker. Then, lots of monotonous cutting of labels (Seven Towns for the square faces, sign vinyl for the triangular faces).

It probably took about 5 hours total, but was done in 30 minute stretches so it's a good project if you don't have large blocks of time. The end result looks and feels pretty good.

I also want to mention (brag?) that this brings my tally of unique twisty puzzles to 99, counting a recent Luminations - but not Merlin, Nemesis, Lights Out or Lights Out 2000.

I'm still on the fence about the electronic puzzles - twisty or not? Of any of the electronic "twistys", the Luminations deserves to be counted since it does involve actual physical twisting of the puzzle. The Orbix (which we added to TwistyPuzzles.com) gets to be an honorary Twisty since Meffert sells it - does it bring Lights Out and its successors (Lights Out 2000, Cube & Deluxe) and ancestors (Merlin, etx) with it, since those are the same sort of puzzle? How about Nemesis, which is apparently motion sensitive in the later levels?

Opinions?

Nice work! For your information there is also black milliput available.

About the electronic, I have some in my collection but they are not twisty puzzles, however I also collect some general 3D puzzles some of them are 3D puzzles like Orbix, Lightout Cube, Luminations.

Ton

> I'm still on the fence about the electronic puzzles - twisty or not?

The Lights Out type of puzzles are definitely closer to twisties than many mechanical puzzles. Like proper twisty puzzles they have random positions, and there is a generic way of solving it that works on any position. They could even be made in mechanical form instead of electronic. The basic mathematics behind them is much the same as Rubik's Clock.

Most mechanical puzzles do not have this similarity (e.g. assembly/disassembly, ring/string, sliding puzzles with unequal tiles etc.).

This is why I feel that any twisty collector/solver should also enjoy the Lights Out puzzles, even if they cannot really be called twisty.

> How about Nemesis, which is apparently motion sensitive in the later levels?

I don't know it except from pictures, so can't comment. If it has 'random' positions, that can be solved in some deducible generic way that always works without any reliance on chance, dexterity, speed, or external knowledge, then it would certainly qualify for getting on my site eventually.

Categorising is always a problem when naming a specialised site. Either you choose a specific name (e.g. twistypuzzles) then you have to justify expanding it to other things that do not quite fall under that heading, or you use a generic name and have to justify why you don't include certain things. There is always a grey area.


Jaap

Wow! Nemesis motion sensitive? Cool! I'll have to bring mine out again and go through all the levels to verify it. Hard to play with it with a lot of people and children around.

The Nemesis is actually an interesting puzzle. When you turn it on, you have no idea what you're supposed to do except for pressing on of the 4 color buttons. Then when you have to figure out, at first, randomly how the puzzle wants you to solve the levels by pressing the buttons and deducting from the negative or positive (button lighting up) what needs to be done next. The puzzles change all the time and you always have to first discover the problem and then deducted the answer. It sounds like it qualifies Jaap.

The only drawbacks is the Nemesis is somewhat loud and if you play it around any young children, chances are you will have to give it up to the child. They love the lights and sounds, even if they can't solve it.

Always Cubing,
Duane Cash
Rubix Corner

Nice work! Trunc cube does take a while eh?