Today I finally finished my first self designed puzzle, it is a wooden book with an internal locking mechanism. I intended to make a locked Aluminium briefcase like the "open & shut case", but I am not yet able to produce a working locking mechanism on a sub-centimeter scale. Luckily I stumbled across a ready made "wooden book" box in a shop some time ago. It has 22 mm free space inside, which turned out to be enough for the mechanism I wanted to make, even with my (lack of) woodworking tools and ditto experience. Of course the locking mechanism is not visible in these pictures, it may be seen at MPP3 by those who manage to open the book.
- MyPuzzleBook.JPG (19.36 KiB) Viewed 9374 times
I started experimenting woodworking by reproducing an existing wooden cube puzzle that I saw in the collection of a fellow puzzle collector (I don't know the name of the puzzle, if you recognize it then please post the answer). This try-out made clear that I really need proper tools to cut decent 45-degree or 90-degree angles, and that sanding any wooden surface by hand does make it smooth, but definitely not flat.
I ended up sacrificing an existing wooden soma cube to make the puzzle cube that I wanted by just cutting and glueing parts together.
The hardest part was cutting the panels for the required box to accurate dimensions and with proper 90-degree angles (I had to abandon the plan of using 45-degree angles at all).
The best part of it was when I came up with a second challenge for this cube/packing puzzle, by fixing one piece to the box.
This is the first and last time I built a wooden box without proper tools!
- My6inaBox.JPG (17.01 KiB) Viewed 9374 times
The good news is that both puzzels now work properly and I have learned a bit about woodworking.
The bad news is that I now need to buy proper woodworking tools (in stead of new puzzles).
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