Half Hour

The half hour puzzle is a Stewart Coffin classic, and if you don’t have a copy in your collection you really should. Although this puzzle is fun and approachable by anyone, it’s far from simple. The pieces were deliberately chosen to be as tricky as possible, and there is only one solution. Mr. Coffin has this to say about it: “The six-piece version of the 3 x 3 x 3 cube will be considered first. For aesthetic reasons, one might prefer that all the pieces be the same size, but this is impossible, so the nearest approximation is to use three four-block pieces and three five-block pieces. It is also desirable that all pieces be non-symmetrical but this is likewise impossible so two of the four-block pieces will have an axis of symmetry. All pieces will of course be dissimilar. Of the several thousand such combinations possible the author tried several that proved to have either multiple solutions or no solution, until finally finding one with a unique solution.”

Raleigh Puzzles is a new line intended for the beginner collector. Perhaps one who is tired of the low quality import puzzles but not yet ready to make the leap into limited edition, high end puzzles. They are hand made in the USA using the same techniques as our cubicdissection puzzles, but in higher volume and without any lacquer finish.