[next] [prev] [up] Date: Fri, 31 May 96 19:01:11 -0700
~~~ [prev] [up] From: Ronnie Kon <ronnie@cisco.com >
[next] [prev] [up] Subject: Re: realizing 7x7x7 or larger cubes

At 05:00 PM 5/30/96 -0700, Scott Huddleston wrote:
>
>>In my opinion mechanical designs for the 7 and above will have to be
>>fundamentally different from those for the 6 and below, because that's
>>the point at which the "buried" corner of a corner cubie extends past
>>the surface of the face during a face turn and thus it's not possible
>>to build the thing as rigid pieces connected to a central mechanism, at
>>least not without cutting away part of some face-center cubies.
>
>One solution to this dilemma is to let some of the "cubies" become
>"brickies" (i.e., rectangular bricks instead of cubes). In this approach,
>there's no limit in principle on N to how large an NxNxN puzzle you could
>build with the standard mechanism. There is, of course, the lower limit
>you just described to how small the corner cubies could become.

I've had this dream of making cubies which attach (via bars or perhaps
electromagnets) to their neighbors, with the smarts to detect the torque of
a turn and release until the turn has been completed. You could then sell
corner cubies, edge cubies, face cubies, and internal cubies one-at-a-time
and people could build their own puzzles as large as they wanted.

I'll buy enough for an order 10 cube if anyone cares to make this. :-)

Ronnie


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