Lollipop puzzle

This puzzle is very similar to Dumb-bell puzzle. For craft tips you can read Dumb-bell puzzle. The aim of the puzzle is removing the ring.

If you want make your own puzzle this small drawing can help you,

Stand up African ball puzzle

I made this puzzle also long time ago. If you turn this photo (or this puzzle) upside down, you will see this puzzle is exactly same with African ball puzzle. The aim of this puzzle is transferring the ring to the opposite side. This puzzle is very nice for making as a coffee table puzzle. It looks nice, very easy to make and difficult to solve for your visitors and friends. My puzzle dimensions are here,

If you are planing to make one as a coffee table puzzle you can make a little bigger. I made wooden ring from a wooden dough roller. You can cut it with a scroll saw or you can make something square etc. Rope arrangement is visible from photo. Two end of the rope are fixed to base.

Dumb-bell puzzle

The summer is hot and I am very lazy. I found a lot of small string puzzles in my puzzle storage box. This puzzles are easy to make. I made this puzzle long time ago with very limited workshop possibilities. I bought wooden balls from a craft store. The rod that connect two ball is 10 mm round ready stock. And I made for wooden ring from a wooden dough roller. The aim of this puzzle is removing the ring.

If you want make your own puzzle this small drawing can help you for dimensions.

If you can find wooden beads, you can cut wooden round disks and you can make a puzzle looking like a barbell. This may be a different and nice design.

 

Eight cubes

This puzzle is made of eight cubes. On each small cube there are six different shape (or color) The aim of this puzzle is to arrange eight cubes so each face of the cube will contain same four shape (or color) and all internal touching cube faces will have same shape (or color).  This puzzle is more difficult to solve than you expect. By turning cubes and trying, it’s nearly impossible to find correct solution. For each small cube arrangement there are two way. You can read more about the mathematics of this puzzle from here. I made for myself two different version of this puzzle. I used 30x30x30 mm (11/4″x11/4×11/4) wooden cubes. I cut them from a 30×30 mm stock with a miter saw. For the version on the left I draw shapes with some templates and painted them with an ink pen. For the colored version I draw circles on each cube face and I painted outside of the cubes with black and inside of the circles with color ink pens. You can make also with wood burning or by pattern transfer methods on wood. If you want you can also print labels and you can put labels on school cubes etc. Or you can find your best method.

If you want make your own puzzle, puzzle pieces are here. You can read also more information about this puzzle and you can find the solution of this puzzle from Jaap’s octacube puzzle page. If you follow solution steps you can solve and also you can understand better this puzzle.

Half cubes

This puzzle pieces are made by joining half cubes. I guess original idea belongs to Toshiaki Betsumiya. He was designed Gemini puzzle for Naef spiegel AG. This company has very nice products. You can see some of their other puzzles fom Rob’s puzzle page. Gemini puzzle is aiming to make a 4x4x5 block fom a mathematical set made by joining half cubes. After Stewart

Coffin was designed “Split cube”. He was designed a 4x4x4 cube by using some pieces of this mathematical set.

And lastly I designed my own puzzle “Half cubes” by using some other pieces of this mathematical set. This puzzle has four solution. Puzzle pieces are here,

For making this puzzle you must cut 16 half cube. For this purpose I used a 40×20 mm ready stock and I cut 40x40x20 mm pieces with my hand miter saw. If you glue first 7 th pieces (bottom line third piece) you can use this piece as a jig for gluing other pieces. Another easy to make and difficult to solve puzzle. If you need solution you can preview or download this free PDF file including pieces photos and solution from here. ( 0.3 MB on secure server box.com)

Skyscraper

This puzzle is one of my old puzzle designs and craft. I made this puzzle long time ago from Jenga parts. I was found some small  Chinese Jenga sets for a very low price. You can make this puzzle very easily with a hand saw by cutting and gluing Jenga pieces. If you want you can make also a better copy by using ready stocks. I painted puzzle pieces with acrylic paint. I am sure you can paint also better than me. Puzzle pieces are here,

 

Wooden knot 1

This is a well known 3 pieces wooden puzzle. This puzzle was published in a article by Jerry Slocum. Unfortunately this puzzle was difficult to make. Because most of the dimensions are related with material thickness and if you don’t have a thickness planer finding the right material was difficult. I decided to make a parametric design according to material thickness.

You can calculate your dimensions easily according to your material. I made mine from pine but I advise using a hard wood between 18 – 25 mm. (3/4 ” – 1″).  You can cut holes easily with a scroll saw or a hand jewelry saw. If you want you can make pieces longer or you can change their end shape. You can make rounded ends etc. This puzzle isn’t very difficult to solve but push you to think, for this reason I like this puzzle.

Two ball string puzzle

 

I don’t know the name of this puzzle. The aim of this puzzle is to get both beads on the same loop. This puzzle looks like “African ball puzzle” but completely different. I saw this puzzle in an article written by Jerry  Slocum. In this article there are a few other puzzles to make and their solutions. You can find detailed instructions for making them and the solution of this puzzle from this PDF article. I used 20mmx20mmx120mm beech. I cut the center of the block only for a different look. Holes are 10 mm. For this kind puzzles, you can find ready wooden beads in craft stores. But if you cant find, you can make wooden cubes and drill them. Two end of the rope are fixed to small beads. A small and funny to solve puzzle. Thanks to Jerry Slocum for this article.

Bottle safe

 

This puzzle is my craft. I made this puzzle for a Coca-Cola bottle. The bottle is the imitation of the first Coca-Cola bottle (1899) produced for 125. anniversary of the company. This puzzle is inspired from well known wine glass puzzles. The aim of this puzzle is solving the disentanglement puzzle at the left, taking the key and opening the padlock at the right. This is a very easy mechanical puzzle to solve. But I made it as a decorative coffee table puzzle for my bottle. I used two kind of wood. The base is white pine, and other parts are a kind of beech. Finally I made an oil finish.

This puzzle is different. The upper dowel is fixed and on the middle part there is a slot. For
removing the bottle you must shift the middle part, but you can’t remove it completely from the assembly. If you want make your own bottle safe puzzle I prepared a file that contains detailed instructions, dimensions, drawings photos etc. You can download or preview this free PDF file from here (1.2 MB on secure server box.com) 

City square

This small village has only four houses. But unfortunately there isn’t a square. Can you make a square by using this four piece ? The aim of this puzzle is to make a square with this four piece. I designed this puzzle yesterday. After drawing on my computer, I went to my workshop and I found some scrap woods. I made this puzzle from 6 mm mahogany. I cut pieces with a hand miter saw and hand scroll saw in one hour. Puzzle pieces are very small. Each piece is about 50×60 mm. You can cut from any material that you wish with a scroll saw or you can make a laser cut version. This puzzle hasn’t a replay value but you can put pieces in your pocket and have fun with friends. I added to Pdf file also a print and play version. Experienced puzzle enthousiasts can solve this puzzle from picture. Solution is on the last page of the PDF file.

If you want make your own puzzle you can preview or download free PDF file including scroll saw pattern to cut, print and play version and solution from here (0.3 Mb on secure server box.com)

If you want make a laser cut version asci dxf file (you can convert to other file formats)  is here. Red lines are for decoration and white lines for cutting.