Puzzle Cubes

[Gregory Matthews]

Rubik's Cube:  Probably most people reading here have played with this toy and know what it is.  It is simply a 3 x 3 or 4 x 4 or 5 x 5 cubic grid that you twist in various ways to form patterns.

Soma Cube:  Probably many of you have seen this toy as sold in stores.  It may consist of seven (7) pieces put together to form a cube.  Once you have taken it apart, the challenge is to put it together in the same manner that it was when you purchased it.  A 7-piece, 3 x 3 x 3 version can be put together in 240 unique ways and 480 ways if you allow mirroring.

Zobrist Cube:  The Zobrist Cube is the latest (2015) addition to the family of puzzle cubes.  It can be purchased from Amazon, as other places. In its 3 x 3 x 4 version it may have 33 individual pieces.  This will allow some 20,000 different configurations and over 8,000,000 solutions.  A 52 page solution book ( With a few of the solutions.) may be included with the Cube.  But, it will likely take some time to learn how to use the individual solutions. 

E.G.  The following is the complete solution for # 87:

bhkm-su achl-tv bgno-tv bgjo-rt ajlm-ru ajko-tw ajko-rt aejk-uw

bfhl-tv fhkm-uv fhkl-sv fhkl-rw fgjm-rt aimo-tw bekn-su bekn-rv

behl-uw begn-st jkmn-rw jklo-rs bcim-st ejlo-sv ejlo-ru ahil-uv

eijo-rt ilmn-rs ijno-tv abkn-rt agin-rt aghk-uv hjlo-st blmo-sw

bkln-rs aclm-uv gkmo-rs afhk-tv ackl-sw ackl-rv gjkn-sv gjkn-rv

bilo-sv bilo-rv bijn-st acjk-tv ghmn-tw ghio-st bhln-tw bhln-st

 

 NOTE: While I find this interesting, I have not yet purchased one.   I simply suggest that if your are into such, you may want to purchase it as it is likely to challenge you for sometime, even with a large number of solutions provided.