Penguin board

Another peg solitaire board. Mr. George Bell advised me this “Truncated triangle board“. Thanks again from here. When I saw this board I was think an owl shape but after drawing the board I decided for a penguin. A very small but very nice board. You can read more from George Bell’s triangular peg solitaire page and find problems for this board. Rules are same with peg solitaire but diagonal moves also allowed. You can play online from here.

This board dimensions is approximately 110×160 mm. I used 18 mm white pine. Marbles are standard 16 mm marbles. For penguin eye I used two 7 mm glass bead. I drilled marble holes with 13 mm drill. Hole depth is about 6 mm. Black lines are made by wood burning. I painted black parts with ink and I applied a very thin varnish.

If you want make your own penguin board I prepared two free PDF file. One of them include cutting, drilling and painting  template, other file is problem cards. I prepared 35 card from easy to difficult. You can preview or download them from links given below.
Template PDF for cutting, drilling, painting etc.  ( 65 KB on secure server box.com) 
Problem cards PDF ( 11.4 MB on secure server box .com)

Star peg solitaire

Yesterday I went to local market for weekly shopping. I saw this nice bamboo bowl. I planned making a cover on this bowl and transforming it to a peg board. When I arrived to home, I saw in a shelf in my workshop the wooden cover of a broken jar. I am very lucky. Both of them has same diameter. I decided to use this cap. First I draw on computer this star shaped board. But with a standard board outside circle holes was too much far from center and I decided to make curved lines. My cap also has a curved top. After I printed my drawing and transferred it on my cap. I drilled holes and made lines with a wood burning tool. For pegs I used glass beads that I was bought a lot of them for this purpose.

This star peg solitaire has same rules with peg solitaire. You must fill all holes with pegs except one. You must play by jumping a peg over it’s neighbor into the vacant hole and than remove from the board the peg so jumped. You can jump only over one peg and you must follow lines. The aim of this puzzle is leaving one one peg on board. You can start with any empty hole that you wish. If you start with an empty hole on outside circle holes you will finish on inside circle or if you start with an empty hole on inside circle holes you will finish on outside circle. You can read more about this puzzle from George Bell’s peg solitaire page. You can view also two nice vintage puzzle example “Penta” from here and “Star solitaire” here.

But back side of my cap was empty and I decided to make another small board, And this is back side of my cap (or board). This puzzle is “Mini triangular peg solitaire“. Rules are same. You must fill all holes with pegs except one. You must play by jumping a peg over it’s neighbor into the vacant hole and than remove from the board the peg so jumped. You can jump only over one peg and you must follow lines. The aim of this puzzle also is leaving one one peg on board. But if you start only with correct empty hole you can leave one peg. You must also find correct starting hole. You can read more about this puzzle or you can see solution from here. You can see two vintage commercial example “Mini solitaire” from here and “Little triangle solitaire” from here. Thanks from here to Mr. George Bell for this two puzzle and for his website.

If you want make your own puzzle you can find easily a small bowl. My bowl has 100 mm diameter. If you can’t find something wooden you can use small porcelain or glass cups etc. For making easy covers without a lathe you can cut with a scroll saw two circle and glue them. For this method you can see my “Ball truck” or “Ball and cube” puzzles. For pegs you can cut them from 4 – 5 or 6 mm ready round wooden stocks. And you can use this image file for transferring lines on your board. You can scale it according to your board and print.

Eight peg solitaire

This puzzle is a variation of peg solitaire. I don’t know the origin of this puzzle but this problem included in a lot of math puzzle book. The aim of the puzzle is exchanging two color marbles. A marble can move forward to an empty space or can jump over one peg if the back side of this peg is empty. Moving backward is forbidden. It’s more difficult than it looks. This puzzle hasn’t a replay value as the majority of mechanical puzzles. I made this one in a India made pencil box. For board I cut a thin (3mm) pine. I drilled 8 mm holes and used 13 mm small marbles.  You can make easily your own puzzle in a few hour and up cycle your empty pencil boxes. you can find the solution from Jim Storer web site.

Wiegleb board

This is my Wiegleb peg solitaire board. Rules are same with peg solitaire played on English or French board. If you didn’t played before, you can learn rules from here. This board contains 45 holes and 44 pegs. For making this board I used a piece of plywood and 16 mm marbles. A wooden pizza cutting board can be used. I made the circular slot around the table with a router. For 16 mm marbles 13 mm holes are good for me. the gap  between two marble is 6 mm. Table diameter is about 280 mm. I painted the plywood with black ink and applied a lacquer finish. If you want learn more about peg solitaire and different boards you can visit George Bell’s peg solitaire page. There is a lot of information about peg solitaire.

Minipeg

This is a simple peg solitaire puzzle played on 4×4 board. As you can guess this puzzle isn’t for puzzle enthusiasts. I designed this puzzle as a training puzzle for small children about 6-7 years old. 4X4 board is easy. The challenges start with beginner level for teaching basic removals. I think after finishing this challenges, a child may be ready for English or French board.

This is a very easy craft project. You can make a 4×4 board as you wish from wood, cardboard, fabric etc. and finding funny game pieces isn’t difficult. There is 40 challenge card. Challenge cards are two sided. At the back side of each card there is the solution for this challenge. I printed them on a card stock in a print on demand company. You can print as you like and cut with a craft knife and steel ruler. Keep your fingers away.

I think an easy, funny and educational craft project for your kids or as a gift for friend’s kids. If you want make your own puzzle you can download free PDF file including print and play cards from here (3.7 MB on secure server box.com)