Motivation From The Cutlery Drawer Oskar's Nested Burr Two pieces removed and I shy away I received this 3D printed puzzle back in December last year. I didn't order it because I actually had never heard of it. I know that it was made by Mike Rollberg but I am not sure how it came to be in my possession. It must have been a gift from someone and I'm very sorry that I cannot remember who sent it to me. It must have included it in another delivery. To whoever you are, thank you very much - I hadn't realised up until this week how good a puzzle it actually was. Thank you Mike for printing this and getting it to me. Of course, being a puzzle design by Oskar van Deventer, I should have realised it was going to be fabulous! It's an 18 piece burr but completely different to the usual design and much more interesting than most 18 piece burrs. I left this in our correspondence tray that sits in our kitchen for a few days after it arrived and picked it up intermittently and took a couple of pieces out, realised what was going to happen if I progressed further and stopped there quickly. I put it back in the tray and weirdly it attracted the cats. There is something about the texture of 3D printed puzzles that they seem to love - I heard a funny noise behind me one evening and saw a cat at the puzzle, shooed her off and picked it up to check for bite marks. No damage but it was covered in cat saliva! YUCK! I dried it off and moved it to the cutlery drawer where it sat on top of the small knives for quite a long time. I picked it up periodically because I kept being reminded it was there every time I set the table for a meal. At some point I think I even removed the first 6 pieces and hurriedly put them back. It gets even more frightening as you take out more pieces because stuff does get a bit loose. Having said this, as long as you hold it properly it doesn't fall apart. Eventually Mrs S started to get a bit annoyed having a puzzle permanently in the cutlery drawer. She understands the cat slobber situation but doesn't want puzzles in the house kitchen any longer than they have to be there. A week or so ago, I got shouted at (again) and the puzzle was forcibly removed from the cutlery drawer and I was told that if it was seen again then I might need a surgical removal of puzzle from an orifice that is not intended for that direction of travel. Motivation had finally arrived and yesterday I progressed through a sequence of piece removal to get myself a nice pile o'pieces: Now that looks intimidating Still intimidating! What about the reassembly? Interestingly, the disassembly has a coloured rhythm to it and as long as you remember that rhythm then you have a big help with the reassembly of the burr. A bit of experimentation is required to work out the orientation of the pieces but it's usually fairly easy to work out when one is pointing the wrong way or needs rotating 90º along its axis. After about a half hour of play, I had put it back together - it's really very clever and delightfully tactile to play with. If you get a chance to play with one of these then jump at it (you can download the files to print it yourself from Oskar's file repository). It's really rather clever! https://www.puzzlemad.co.uk/2026/11/motivation-from-cutlery-drawer.html #cutlerydrawer #mikerollberg #burrtwo #nestedburr #rss #feeds #linksharing #qwibbit

Can Alexander Turn Me Into A Designer? One Way Or Another by Alexander Magyarics At the Assisi IPP I spent quite a long time on one particular puzzle and got absolutely nowhere despite it looking like an apparently straightforward idea. Now obviously, if it was good enough to be allowed into the design competition then it had to be significantly better than straightforward. At the time, I had absolutely no idea who deigned it or even who made it but the original version was crafted from beautiful wooden pieces which is like silver to a magpie for me. Lots of people seemed to be solving it and enjoying their Aha! moments but not me. I was delighted to discover that this fabulous challenge had been designed by my friend and puzzle savant, Alexander Magyarics. Of course, at the puzzle party itself, I could not resist and bought a copy direct from Alexander. It's not wood but it has been beautifully 3D printed with a very nice set of textured pieces which makes sliding them around in the tray with a fingertip much easier than had it been smooth. Later, when the competition results were announced Alexander was hugely delighted to see his puzzle get awarded a prize in the Jury Honourable Mention section. To achieve a prize from the incredible puzzlers on that jury is an amazing feat as they are very discerning. I have been playing with my copy on and off ever since I got home. The aim is to take the single L Triomino and 3 Tetrominoes and place them in the tray with the single disk in one corner. Yep! That's easy peasy - there's lots of space. But then, having placed the pieces, the aim is to be able to slide them around in the tray until you have moved the disk into the diagonally opposite corner. There are 4 empty spaces in the tray so this should be relatively easy? Right? Erm...no! As you can see from the photo above none of the pieces are able to move apart from the disk so that's not going to work. Try again! What this means is that we have two puzzles in one - first design your puzzle and then work out the sequence to move the pieces until the required diagonal placement has been achieved. The thing about this challenge is that having no linear pieces seems to make them block each other very quickly. I have found lots of configurations where a few moves are possible. I have found quite a few placements where there seems to be plenty of initial movement possible but it quickly gets blocked up after that. I have even found quite a number of antislide positions where nothing can move at all! What I haven't managed to find is any kind of placement where I can move anything more than 5 or 6 moves. I have never been very good at sliding piece puzzles but have usually eventually solved them (even if it took many more moves than it should have) but I have absolutely no design talent in me at all. Unfortunately for me, the design component is an absolutely key feature to this challenge! I have been at it for many hours and of course cannot keep track of what I have tried so have probably done the same thing hundreds of times. Ken apparently solved it relatively quickly but then he is a MUCH better puzzler than me and is quite good at design. At one point, I did think to myself: "self, maybe you should try using Burrtools!" Now, I am quite good at using BT to solve puzzles after so many years of practice but I have realised that I have absolutely no idea how to enter this into the program. Obviously it is easy to put the pieces in but I don't know how to get it to transform from one shape to another. It may be that BT is not the right tool to use but it was sobering to realise that Alexander had probably done all this in his head! There is very little in my head and I am quite envious of people who store stuff in theirs. Mrs S may say that having puzzles in your head is a waste of space but at least it is something in there. My head is full of nothing but leaves and whimsy and a very odd whispering noise which won't go away. This puzzle is very portable so I will be carrying it with me for a good while and hopefully someone at work will be able to solve it even if I never manage it. To answer the question of the title of the post... NO, Alexander cannot turn me into a designer! Not yet anyway.😱 If you would like a copy then you should be able to contact Alexander or buy it from Greg. Brian Menold made the original design competition version and has some left for sale on his site. UPDATE 30 minutes later: I have had a final Aha! moment and solved the puzzle - wow! That is really good. Why did that take me so long? I have to heartily agree with the Jury - it is definitely an honourable mention winner. Thank you Alexander! https://www.puzzlemad.co.uk/2026/10/can-alexander-turn-me-into-designer.html #alexandermagyarics #assisiipp #lots #rss #feeds #linksharing #qwibbit

A Well-earned Special Winner Elbow Room by Goh Pit Khiam Goh Pit Khiam has figured quite a bit on this site over the years. He's very prolific but not just someone who exhaustively creates Burrtools assembly puzzles. He has a very odd brain that finds things that are clever and interesting. This week's puzzle is something very special. Elbow room was a huge hit in the IPP design competition. In fact, it was considered so so good that it won a special award - something I have never seen before. The Jury gave it their Grand Prize and the Puzzlers voted it as their favourite from all the puzzles in the design competition. Together, this meant that it was awarded the "Puzzle of the Year" award - this is something I have never seen before and it is absolutely well deserved. It was my number one puzzle which I voted for and that is quite something because the field was so strong. I have already seen that several people liked it so much that they have created their own 3D printed versions. I really wanted to get it in wood - that way I would have a fantastic puzzle to torture people with and a wonderful wood object to go on display. I had my suspicions about who had made it but wasn't certain until the day of the announcement of the winners. and literally as soon as it was confirmed as the winner and the craftsman revealed, I sent an email to Tom Lensch from the IPP dinner. It was so good that I couldn't even wait until after the dinner had finished! Tom responded pretty quickly and put me on the list for when he had made them. I must have reached the front of a long queue last week as I got an email asking to confirm my address and requesting a little PayPal transfer. The hop over the pond seemed to be exceptionally fast this time and just a few days later Mrs S was frowning at me for yet another delivery. She really shouldn't complain - I have slowed down my buying considerably this year! The puzzle was nicely packed and I quickly revealed a nice chunky box made from Cherry with a single Voxel hole in the corner and Tom's mark on the inside. The blocks are a beautifully grained Sapele. There are 2 pieces with an extension on one side and a slot to take the extension and 2 pieces with just slots only. Finally there is a single square cotton-reel type piece which can join two slots. The aim, clearly is to place all the 4 pieces together inside the box as a 2x2x2 cube. However this is only possible if it is done as a sliding pre-linked snake assembly that transforms into a cube during the insertion. Make an assembly to slide in - NOT like this! Just the very idea of doing that is something that kept me going in the competition area. There is something very tactile about these pieces and making different shaped snakes of linked pieces that keep failing to be able to be inserted through the orifice was quite compulsive. I think I must have spent a good 30-45 minutes being laughed at by various puzzlers when I kept failing but they also encouraged me to keep going. Initially, I was just creating random assemblies and failing but after a while, I actually had to start think©ing about what I was trying and the logic gradually dawned on me. Finally I had my assembly and received a small cheer from puzzlers nearby. The IPP is great (just like the MPP) for having fun poked at you, receiving support when needed as well as cheers when earned. It felt great and due to the elegance of it, I had to keep it as my number one. My number two was the Step by Step by Yavuz Demirrhan because it was also a clever packing puzzle with an unusual twist to it. Elbow room won out for me because of its sheer elegance. When I received my own copy, I had to play straight away and it was just as difficult several months later despite having been solved by me in the past. I spent a little while trying random things before my logical thoughts from June came back and I proceeded to work on it systematically. It didn't take quite as long this second time but was just as enjoyable. This was sooooo good! If you get a chance to work on this then jump at it - it is literally one of the best puzzles of the year. It is so simple in idea and yet so tough and logical to solve. The wood version is certainly the best but even a 3D printed one should be fun. Thank you Tom. It's arrived! Hooray. Safe 2 from Pelikan designJakub and team had not managed to get the Safe 2 SD puzzle ready in time for the last release. Mine arrived on Thursday and so far I have found my first tool and managed to use it make things happen inside. I have no idea what it has done but there's some significant movement going on. I can also undo what I move but then gotten no further. It is still not yet up for sale but preorders are open if you contact Jakub. From my previous posts, the Frau L. and one version of Loach Bed is sold out but the rest are still available as I type so you should have a look before they sell out. https://www.puzzlemad.co.uk/2026/10/a-well-earned-special-winner.html #gohpit #pitkhiam #winner #puzzle #tom #elbowroom #ipp #grandprize #rss #feeds #linksharing #qwibbit

Pelikan Summer Release Part II Continuing what I started last week. Jakub sent me the latest offerings which I suspect will be released later this week. I showed them off at the MPP yesterday and a several people were completely bamboozled by them. Minima For Frederic Minima for Frederic by Dr Volker Latussek Oh, Yesssss! More Minima puzzles! By now, you will all have realised that I absolutely adore the Minima series and all its' variants. Initially they were designed by Frederic Boucher to have a box with a 2x2x3 cavity and varying numbers of oddly shaped, but small, pieces to be fitted inside the box. Usually the aim was to make sure all the holes were occluded and at times the solution required interesting rotations of the pieces. Some of the puzzles had clever slots in the box to facilitate the rotations which did sometimes make the puzzle very confusing. One or two of them had extra "bits" attached to the pieces. Other designers jumped on the bandwagon with all sorts of interesting shapes and challenges. I have loved every single one of them so far. There is something very special about Volker's brain - he sees shapes and movements that almost no-one else can see and produces challenges that are incredibly difficult and interesting to explore. He created the amazing Minima-Flop and I have been waiting with bated breath for another special Minima from him. Here we have, not only another fun Minima designed by Volker, but also a Minima which he felt was good enough to be named as a tribute to the originator of this series, Frederic. Jakub and team have manufactured it from a very beautifully grained Oak and Wenge. Volker wrote this about the puzzle: "A few years ago, Frederic Boucher wrote to me and invited me to contribute to his MINIMA series. To make my decision easier, he suggested that I didn’t have to fill the box’s internal volume strictly as 3x2x2, but could also consider using half-cubes and thus interpret the box as 6x4x4. I still remember well how I expressed my confusion to him about this; from my point of view, this offer – though certainly well-intentioned – contradicted the originally intended minimalist design concept of a 3x2x2 box, given the generous interpretation of the strict guidelines. Now we all know what outstanding ideas Frederic was able to realise in his MINIMA series. Nevertheless, I wanted to resist this temptation and only agreed to the project under the strict conditions. I’m still pleased with the result today: MINIMA-FLOP, especially as I was able to completely fill the 3x2x2 box with four identical Tricubes and incorporate the FLOP moves – which were so important to me – into the solution. In fact, I was very satisfied with the result, and I think Frederic was too. However, when I was recently playing with one of my 14-piece complete sets of building blocks of the same size, I checked whether six of these building blocks – each consisting of one cube and two half-cubes – could be used to fill a 6x4x4 box in an appealing way. I was pleased to find that, out of the 924 possible arrangements, only 13 filled a 6x4x4 volume in 50 different ways. For whatever reason, I then looked for suitable 3x2 openings – which I’m familiar with from my FLOPs – in order to offer a challenging and unique solution. I was so impressed by the result that, despite my initial reluctance, I asked Frederic if he would sponsor it. To my great delight, he agreed immediately, and so Pelikan is now able to release this puzzle under the name MINIMA FOR FREDERIC. I’m very pleased about this, and I think Frederic is too." As you can see above, the puzzle arrives in a special transport configuration which took me quite a long time to actually unravel from the box. It is so nice to have this extra challenge. It reveals the rather unusual pieces to be packed inside: Six interesting pieces to be packed. Having managed to unpack the pieces, I realised that the assembly was going to be a huge challenge. Especially when you remember the rest of Volker's incredible rotational packing puzzles. I actually struggled to make the 4x4x6 cuboid for a while and when I did construct one, I placed it alongside the box and looked for ways the shape could possibly be taken apart through the holes. The cuboid could be arranged in 8 ways to try and interestingly, only 3 of them had even a single removable piece which was very helpful but to my horror, none of those positions would allow a second piece removal (even with interesting rotations). The constraints of the box just wouldn't let another piece out. At this point I was worried that there might be dozens of assemblies of the pieces to then try and find a way to get them inside the box. Because of my time-constraints, I went to Burrtools to look for cuboid assemblies. There are just 2 and I had found the wrong one first. I used BT and constructed the correct assembly and looked again to see how it could be disassembled using the various holes in the walls. The first piece obviously has to just lift out the top hole but after that there is a sequence of clever rotations using the holes until there are just 2 pieces remaining. Those two pieces did look impossible to place inside but obviously that was going to be the main challenge that Volker had intended. Time to set to proper work... At this point, I had my assembly order positions and then "just" had to work out how to get the first two pieces into position. I tried for days to get them inside and in position for the third piece to be placed but I just couldn't get them into place. I went back to the cuboid several times to see whether I had missed an alternative assembly or orientation but it was correct. There is plenty of room in the box but those two pieces need a very clever and very specific set of moves around each other to get them into place. After 3 days of trying, I finally packed them into place and after that the rest rotated into the correct placements fairly easily. My Goodness! It's absolutely brilliant! If you like Minima puzzles then you must buy this. If you like Latussek puzzles then you must by this. Hell, if you Like puzzles then you must buy this! It is up there with the best Minima puzzle designs by Frederic - it is a very suitable tribute. Thank you Volker. Fatomino Fatomino by Dr Volker Latussek This gorgeous creation has been made by Pelikan using American Walnut and a rather fabulous Zebrano. As soon as I saw it I was immediately taken back to one a fabulous packing puzzle by Hajime Katsumoto in 2016, Penta in a box. In the original puzzle, the cavity of the box was a 3x3x3 cube and there were 5 planar pentominoes to be fitted inside allowing the lid to close over them. It looks pretty easy but there is a catch - the lid cannot close over any piece in the top row at the front and any piece in the lid cannot close over an adjacent piece that would end up behind it. This simple looking packing puzzle required quite a lot of thought. So what could Volker possibly do to improve on such a simple but fun design? Volker wrote his thoughts about it: "It’s already been 10 years since Hajime Katsumoto caused a stir with his PENTA IN A BOX – a brilliant idea to pack five of the twelve flat Pentacubes into a 3x3x3 box with a clamshell lid. As I don’t collect puzzles myself, it wasn’t until years later, during a joint visit, that I was able to play with Götz Schwandtner’s copy at Bernhard Schweitzer’s house. The interplay between the Pentacubes and the clamshell lid feels really good. And the chosen mix of the five Pentacubes is truly something special. I’ve been experimenting for some time now with the FATs – the 15 Pentacubes, each of which is described by a 3x2x2 envelope. In doing so, I naturally also recalled PENTA IN A BOX; interestingly, I hastily dismissed it again because I concluded that there couldn’t be five FATs that could fit into a 3x3x3 box with a clamshell lid. Something very fundamental went wrong with this thought experiment. How foolish of me, considering that there are 262,344 cuboid arrangements. An obvious mistake. For with FATOMINO and its one of potentially 303 combinations of five FATs, it is even possible to achieve a filling with a unique solution. What’s more, I maintain that there is no other combination with a unique solution. In this sense, FATOMINO, modelled on PENTA IN A BOX, is unique. In fact, I would very much like it to stay that way." I did ask Volker why he called the pieces "FATs" and apparently it originated from George Miller who described the pieces as being able to fit in a FAT cigar box. It is just a way to refer to the NON-planar pentominoes. The pieces are very interesting and very satisfying to play with: A beautiful hinged box and 5 non-planar pentominoes Recalling the problems that I had with the original puzzle, I knew what sort of arrangements I had to attempt to create: Not going to work The aim was to make 2 separate packings that can be folded onto each other with a hinged edge. This sounds very simple but it took me quite a while to realise that the intersection of the leading edges as the hinge closed was really causing a problem. I had to hunt for a very particular arrangement. It would be tempting to brute force this with Burrtools but it shouldn't be necessary. After a few failures, you should be able to think of the type of organisation that you need and then hunting for it is tough but fun. Yet again, Volker produces a variation on an award winning puzzle and manages to make it even better than everything that has gone before. This is a MUST have puzzle as well! It is simply superb. If you enjoyed Penta in a box then you will adore this one. Flummox Flummox by Benjamin Heidt This is the second burr in this summer release by Pelikan. Both of them have been sent out in an unsolved position and the aim is to created the solved shape before then completely disassembling and then reassembling it fully. Flummox is well named as it is VERY difficult and will really challenge even the best burrista's. It is a caged 6 piece burr with "extra constraining pieces" and a stick length of 8 voxels made from a very striking combination of Zebrano, Purpleheart and Maple. When it arrives, one of the burr sticks is protruding up out of the box and will not simply push back into place. It took me a good ½ hour of fiddling about (there are quite a lot of possible moves of the other 5 pieces) before you can make enough space to sink the protruding stick back to flush with the cage. After this, obviously, the challenge is to disassemble the burr completely into 6 sticks and a frame. This is not for a beginner to burrs. It really is a very complex disassembly and there are a LOT of well disguised moves including lateral as well as forward and backward moves. The disassembly level is 30.1.2.3.2.2. Whilst that doesn't look too bad and I would usually say that is an optimal number of moves for a satisfying burr but in this case, with a frame, and being very difficult to see inside, this is VERY difficult. It's very rewarding when the pieces start to come out but even after the removal of one or two of them, the remainder remain very difficult to remove. This will be impossible for most puzzlers to reassemble without resorting to Burrtools but creating that file will be an extra challenge for you. That was a massive challenge! Fudou Fudou by Frederic Boucher Yes, another incredibly tough challenge by Frederic Boucher. I had to ask Jakub what the aim was. The Bubinga pieces arrived all nicely packed in the tray and I wondered whether we had to create some sort of structure that would stand up. I should have realised that this had a much simpler premise - the aim is to pack all the pieces into the tray in such a way that none of them are able to slide around. The triangular notches cut into most of them will allow them to interlock at 45º angles to each other and will ensure that they can be placed against the wall of the tray to prevent sliding. i.e. pack them into the tray but not orthogonally - simple? Hell, no! I am terrible at anti-slide puzzles. I have managed to find a few very interesting ways the pieces can interact. The aim seems to be to find which pieces will fit together so that their corners reach the sides of the tray and then won't move if others are matched up to do the same. There must be a logical way of thinking about these but I have no skills in this sort of puzzle. It is a fun thing to play with but for me, I have made almost no progress in the 2 weeks that I have been playing. For you clever puzzle enthusiasts this should be a massive challenge. Anything from Frederic is going to be very rewarding. https://www.puzzlemad.co.uk/2026/07/pelikan-summer-release-part-ii.html

They Are Superstars! Friends With 3D Printers Simple Star Puzzle (by Brian Menold) and the Superstar (by Chris P) This has been written and published in advance quite quickly because I am working this weekend. If you see any errors then let me know. I had to do it quite quickly. I am very lucky to have friends with 3D printers! Not only does that make them superstars in my eyes, but in this case Chris actually made me the Superstar puzzle. At the MPP in May, Chris was showing off his amazing printing prowess and amongst them was a version of the star puzzle that had pins and maze plates attached. Like a magpie, I was immediately attracted to the new shiny thing and proceeded to play with the Superstar version that was ready for play. The movement was beautiful and very very confusing. I expressed my lust and Chris said that he might be making more sometime. To my huge surprise, when I arrived at the July MPP, he sidled up to me with a wonderful gift. I have my very own version to bamboozle myself and a nice set of maze plates to prove how useless I am. From the left: Diagonal Superstar, 9 move, 14 move and 36 move challenges Lots of variants - all come apart and collapse the same way When I received the puzzle, Chris had not fully assembled it and I spent a little while taking it apart and marvelling at the smoothness of the moves - 3D printing has really improved over the years. AS with all the star puzzles, it comes apart into 2 pairs of triplets which will fall apart quickly if you don't hold them right. I am sure that all of you have experienced variants of the star puzzle and remember that heartsick moment as it collapses in your hands: Beautifully made with exchangeable maze plates Chris even thought through a way to ensure that the 2 pairs are assembled with the correct chirality. A printed C in the sides ensures that I don't attempt to assemble an impossible version. These will line up to slide together Pins and mazes lined up The interesting thing I find with this is that even knowing what the mazes look like, this doesn't seem to help me with the assembly. Once the pins are all engaged in the mazes, it's a matter of exploring which pieces can move. It is made very confusing by moving diagonally and also having several pieces move at once. I found a very nice sequence and seems to be making progress until boom...I pulled it apart without realising that I had made my way through the maze and back out again. It exploded into pieces on my lap and frightened the cat next to me. Nearly frightened me to death too. Try again! And boom round in a circle (or was it a figure of eight?) and explosion again. Wow! I could not keep track of the process at all. I managed to make it fall apart on me (gulp) at least a dozen times before I finally managed the full assembly. Despite having gone through the maze many many times, I still do not have any idea how I managed it and have an assembled Superstar next to me (not Chris!) and am dreading dismantling it to try the next maze. I think I will try the 9 move version next - hopefully that will prove easier. Thanks so much Chris! I met someone new at the MPP who seems much better at puzzling than me (isn't everyone?) I am ashamed to say that I cannot recall his name but he has instantly become a great friend because he has made a small dream of mine come true. I also suggest that he probably should stay as far away from Mrs S as he possibly can. He has alienated her by providing with a big pile of plastic which she hates and I adore! I have put them away very quickly and plan to get them out in dribs and drabs as and when I get a chance to play. What is it? I can hear you shout at your screens. The voices are quite bad for me these days! 😈 Akaki's Picnic Basket - PLUS a whole bunch of extra challenges A few years ago whilst on holiday in Edinburgh visiting the outlaws, I managed to solve and blog about the incredible puzzles designed by Akaki Kuumeri. My copy was made by the late Eric Fuller from beautiful woods. I had not gotten around to them for ages and had been hoping that Eric would eventually get around to making some of the MANY others which had subsequently been designed. Unfortunately, Eric passed away before this could become a reality and I was stymied in my chance of getting any more by the lack of a 3D printer of my own. I was flabbergasted (and incredibly grateful) when my new best friend announced that he had a whole bunch of these picnic cubes available to be given away just as I was about to leave the MPP! I immediately jumped at the chance as did Tamsin. Tamsin took the basket and the 3 that were in the original set and I blagged the rest. I have another 11 challenges to play with (I actually don't know how many there are in the series but hopefully I can get the rest sometime). The wonderful thing is that these plastic cubes are made with the same voxel size as the version that Eric made 5 years ago. I cannot wait to play - but first, I'd better try another star puzzle. Thank you to my two new best friends for some wonderful challenges. https://www.puzzlemad.co.uk/2026/07/they-are-superstars.html

Burrs With A Twist Literally... With Twisting Movements In Them! Trust Steve to produce something funny with an extra twist in it! Boarin' Burr - the boars appear on every surface First of all, I MUST give proper attribution to the origin of last weeks main puzzle. The wonderful version of the Diagonal Star puzzle that I wrote about last week should actually be named the Sequential Cube. It was designed by the amazingly talented George Bell as a variant of Lee Krasnow's very rare Sequential Star. Practice does improve things with this puzzle - I can now solve the Sequential Star version and the 9 move version quite easily. The 14 move seems to be more problematic for me but I keep trying. If you get a chance to play then go for it - it's very mind-bending. I should also point out that we have a new blog in the puzzlesphere - Fraser, whose name I forgot last week, has started an unassuming little place on the internet where he asks the useful question: Can an idiot solve it? This looks really useful to me - I have been an idiot my whole life (I'm pretty old now) and am rubbish at puzzles. I will be using his advice to see whether I should bother trying to solve some of the puzzles I see on the internet. Go show him some love/views! Today, I am writing about a couple of puzzles that look like burrs and sort of work like burrs in that they are composed of interlocking sticks but there is something twisted inside both figuratively and literally. The IPP provides all of us with a list of puzzles we want. I am lucky enough to be given a few of them every now and then. Everything that the TwoBrassMonkeys do should be added to your list of things you want because there is always something special about them. Here, I have Steve Nichol's exchange puzzle. He designed a burr with some extra challenge to it. The theme is both the boars that are often found zooming around Italian towns causing havoc (Steve, cause havoc??? Oh yes! everywhere he goes) and of course, the name refers to the fact that pieces rotate like bores. and effectively double lock the burr sticks. Steve likes interlocking puzzles but always seems to want to make something a bit more interesting than a standard version. He has created them from hexagonal sticks and round sticks to confuse you. He's made odd movements and multi-step sequential discovery burrs which won my puzzle of the year for 2024. There seems to be no end to the ways that Steve wants to play with your head. In this case he has a burr with boars that got bored and bored their way inside your burr: If you push on a boar then it unscrews from the puzzle! This is interesting and very ingenious. It is quite reminiscent of Oskar's screw burr but extra confusing! Obviously this cannot be entered into Burrtools so you will need to be careful. Luckily everything is sequential and you quickly can produce a bunch of very odd looking sticks. Make sure that you mix them all up so that you have no idea what came from where and what orientation they were in when you started. This was one of my mistakes initially. It did not occur to me that stick orientation would be that critical when I scrambled them and I really struggle to reassemble it the first time. There's nothing boring about this puzzle! I have absolutely no idea how he designed this The multi-coloured sticks can be assembled into a six piece burr in lots of ways but the locking mechanism comes from the bores/boars. Take a look at the notches in the sticks and with a little care it is possible to put it back together again with only a little trial and error as sticks may need switching end over end. Great fun, with a twist - just as we would expect from Steve. Thanks mate. I assume that this will be put up for sale at some point. Keep an eye out on the Two Brass Monkeys website. SV Burr by Richard Williams (P91 puzzles) This burr is a fascinating design by Richard Williams. The aim is to disassemble and reassemble the burr and, most importantly, in the process, understand why it has the name SV Burr - what is SV? I bought it at an MPP last September having watched lots of people struggle both with the disassembly but also get caught out by the reassembly. I made sure not to watch what they were doing and what they had found along the way. I took it home and began playing. Initially it has absolutely no moving parts and takes quite a bit of pushing and prodding to make your first move. Very quickly a tool is o=in your hands - not what you would usually think of as a tool - it's just a bolt. What can you do with a bolt in a burr? There are a couple of holes in the puzzle where you can poke the bolt but no real clue as to whether this is having any effect. After poking and pushing and screwing and unscrewing I did find something and then movement happened. Yay! After that, nothing else was possible but I did have another hole. I "screwed" my courage to the sticking place and put the bolt in the hole and closed up the burr in the hope that I could now use gravity to pull or push something inside. Well, that was a stupid thing to do because now I couldn't move anything. After a day, I contacted Rich to see whether I was on the right track and apparently I had been very stupid! He had never even considered that anyone would be so stupid as to do that and advised me to try and undo what I had done. As always, never underestimate my stupidity! Eventually, I did manage to undo the mess that I had got myself into but it took a couple of days - phew! Then, of course, there was more stupidity! I tightened something to much and stripped some of the plastic off - this rendered my puzzle non-functional! Aargh! Yep, I'm an eejit! At the next MPP, I had to give it back to Rich to fix. I eventually got it back at the last MPP and promised to be more careful with it this time. I started again determined not to prove myself too foolish. I did the first moves again and achieved my sliding burr moves. This time I did not lose a piece inside. I worked on various other possibilities and somehow managed to get more movement. I was screwing and unscrewing but not understanding why it changed things inside. Despite that, I managed to progress. At some point a new too dropped out and I had no idea where it came from. A little exploration revealed a hidden compartment which had been the hidey-hole. The new item was an odd looking tool but there was only one place it could go and in it went. In fact it went in and out several times causing some more screwing movements and another piece came off/out. Turning the puzzle over caused yet another tool to drop out and this time I had noted where from. After searching about there was only one place to try it and yes, more screwing about. Then the final piece was removable and the burr came fully apart: A six piece burr? Nope! A lot more than that.After this it becomes clear what the SV stands for - I'm not going to give it away. You need to get your own copy of this and work it out for yourself. Thanks Rich! So we have to burrs that have lots of twists in the tale and twists in the puzzling. Fabulous - I need to lie down now as I'm really quite dizzy. https://www.puzzlemad.co.uk/2026/08/burrs-with-twist.html

What Is The Right Level? The latest releases by Aaron Wang and friends It's been a frustrating week. The surgeons I work with seem to be trying to kill me. They have lined up a whole bunch of absolutely gigantic operations on either enormously obese, incredibly frail and/or very elderly patients. It's not good for my nerves to do a bunch of revision hip replacements for infection followed by a 7 hour long total femur replacement on a 50kg anaemic 86 year old! Following a week like that it was time to write the on call rotas again yesterday. Needless to say I am knackered! As a result, my puzzle solving prowess has reached new lows. I'm rubbish at puzzles at the best of times but with a week like I have just had, I'm worse than usual! So what do I do with a week like that? I attempt some of the most confusing puzzles I own. Not very bright! Every year at around IPP time, Aaron Wang and his friends in China, club together and release a new batch of disentanglement puzzles. Every year I buy a whole load of them and fail to solve most of them. This year I had hoped for a better result but I'm not entirely certain that will happen. The difference is that Aaron has listened to most of us and has produced a few puzzles that are lower than his usual level 10 difficulty. Also this year there were a bunch more that are made entirely of wire with less enormous lengths of string to get tangled up. I bought 10 - stupid boy. Love Trick by Mr Wu I started with a Level 7, Love Trick. It is designed by a new to me designer, Mr Wu and looks like a nice place to start. Over the years I have solved many puzzles that have the basic double loop and rod pieces in various combinations (for example the Lantern puzzles. There is a nice move sequence to them that can be fun but also confusing if you have to do a lot of them at once. Doing that well remembered move effectively moves the piece from one section to another and eventually a release occurs. The trick is to work out where the piece needs to be moved to sequentially. This one looks nice and easy because there are only a couple of places the piece can be moved to. I duly moved it from one segment to the next and realised that it's now in an odd and awkward to manipulate position. Maybe I should go back and try a different order? Eventually I realised that the order doesn't matter and I just had to be careful how I hold the puzzle to achieve what I need. Hooray! I can solve something This filled me with confidence and I had 2 puzzles to choose from. Aaron himself had designed a fun looking puzzle that was supposed to be level 7 but involved string. I shied away from it and decided to move up a level. Black Hole by DDK DDK is a very prolific designer and most of his puzzles are incredibly difficult. I was very gratified to see the Black Hole was a "mere" level 8. It looks almost easy with what I thought was an obvious exit point. Again, the lack of string really appealed to me. I set to fiddling with it whilst watching TV and found a very nice move almost straight away. That move did change things and made the puzzle look like I needed to aim at a different area than I had first thought. OK let's try something...two pieces in my hands and a little yelp of surprise annoyed Mrs S. Gulp! What had I just done? Lesson for you all - DON'T solve complex puzzles whilst watching TV. I had absolutely no idea how the puzzle came apart and then could not reassemble the damed thing. Doh! Two lovely pieces and no idea how I got them I have spent several hours (my excuse is that work left me very mentally fatigued) and could not put it back together. Luckily, there is an easy reset method to this due to the size of one of the rings. I have reassembled it using the reset and tried to solve it again. Level 8 seems to be beyond me now - I can no longer take it apart. Is level 8 too difficult for me? Bronze Tripod by DDK Whilst trying to think© about the Black Hole, I moved up a level to 9 with the Bronze Tripod also by DDK. This had intrigued me as soon as I had seen it, there looked to be an N-ary component to it (there actually isn't) and it looked to confusingly have two possible exit points. My quick fiddle when I first took my photos, showed me that there are a few possible starting moves for that shuttle but they quickly get blocked inside a loop with nowhere to go. I was reassure that a friend on FB showed that it was solvable and claimed that it was logical. I failed for several days to find the solution to this before I had my first breakthrough. I am not sure why I hadn't tried that particular sequence before but suddenly I had the shuttle in a new and interesting position which would allow me to focus on the other side of the puzzle. Again I got stuck before realising that I could perform an odd reflection move of the shuttle which allowed progression. I started on a new path and before I knew what I was doing, I had two pieces and only the vaguest idea how I had done it. Oh dear! How had I done this? There is no simple way to reset this so I was going to have to find the true pathway. The first two moves were pretty easy to remember but after that I was stuck and kept finding the two pieces separated in my hands. I managed to backtrack without even realising how. For some reason, I was unable to find the route that would allow me to transition between sides of the puzzle. I had to put it down for a while to calm my frazzled nerves and then tried again later. This time I actually had a think© and realised that I needed to consider some of the pieces as a group and manipulate them together and then separately. Suddenly I could see the whole solution in front of me and I was able to reset and then dismantle the puzzle with ease. For a level 9, it is surprisingly just perfect for me. The right amount of thought and discovery intermingled with a frisson of panic at times. Finally, I am able to solve something the correct way. So what is the right level? Level 7 might be a touch easy. Level 8 might be too hard. Level 9 is just right. Something is not right there but my feeble tired brain can't work out what. Now I really need to work on Black Hole again and see if I can actually understand a level 8 puzzle. You really should get some of these puzzles from Aaron or from PuzzleMaster - pick carefully because they are not for beginners. https://www.puzzlemad.co.uk/2026/08/what-is-right-level.html

One...Three...Two...Solved! Galaxy III Galaxy III by DDK Yes, from the title of the post you can tell that I am neither a mathematician nor could I ever be a scrub nurse (who needs to count to 5 preferably in the right order). This puzzle, Galaxy III designed by the amazing DDK and made by Mr Gao which I got from Aaron's recent release has this very strange progression to solution. I have had another bad week and failed to solve everything in sight. I have been moving from wire puzzle to wire puzzle in the hope that I will have another Aha! moment but everything has failed on me. I was then mortified when my facebook friend, Yang Qingliang, showed off that they had solved the Galaxy III and had revealed to the world that they felt it was pretty easy needing only 4 moves. OMG! I am so rubbish at puzzles. Aaron had rated the Galaxy III as only a level 7 and I had picked it up first in the hope that I would have something solved easily to boost my confidence. I had completely failed over the next few hours and eventually put it down to try others. It does look relatively simple with a shuttle straddling one of the wires on the outer layer of the spiral. The shuttle can be threaded right through from that outer wire to the centre with no obstructions but at first glance there isn't an obvious exit point and what you might think is a possible exit is blocked by the pair of oval rings across several layers. Winding round and around in circles is satisfying for a minute or so but when you get nowhere it loses its entertainment value quickly. Having been shamed I went back to it last night and this morning and had one of my very rare thoughts. I remembered back to almost the very beginning of my puzzling journey when I spent what was then a rather large sum of money on the entire Livewire puzzle collection. One of my absolute favourites from them was the Pyramid scheme which had a nice clever trick to it to find a rather counter-intuitive but very clever solution. Pyramid scheme from Livewire puzzles You can see the similarities of the spiral and the blockage ring with the shuttle on one wire. Once I had recalled the interesting idea that solved this one, I tried that move on the Galaxy III and suddenly went from one wire in the shuttle to three. That is fun and hopefully a progression. Next I moved it around a bit and before I knew it, did the same sort of move again from a different position and had 2 wires trapped. WTF? 1...3...2 was an odd sort of progression but I could now see an exit in exactly the same way I found the exit for the Pyramid scheme. Suddenly I had my shout of success and I didn't feel like quite such an eejit and more - I am not thinking about the fact that it is only a simple level 7! I will take the win. Hooray Having taken the photo, it was time to reassemble. I knew the type of moves that were required. It wasn't plain sailing but after a bit of fiddling about I managed it. It is quite fun to watch the non-obvious moves achieve results that don't seem like they should be possible - it's lovely in the same way that the original Livewire puzzle caused so much delight. I will be torturing colleagues with this one this week. At level 7 it might be solvable by someone. Thank you Aaron for the torture! https://www.puzzlemad.co.uk/2026/08/onethreetwosolved.html

An Epic Eyckmans Extravaganza Dikkop Cannonball Hollow 15 Poolster It doesn't seem that long since the last Pelikan release - I just don't know how they maintain such a punishing schedule and keep the quality so very high! Despite producing another huge batch of puzzles in just over a month, they are all absolutely stunningly made with a fit and finish that can only be described as perfection. There are 7 new puzzles to be released in this batch and the first four of them to be reviewed are a progressively more complex and very interesting set of 6 piece burrs. Alfons Eyckmans designs some of the most amazing interlocking puzzles and burrs there are. I have a huge collection of his designs produced by Pelikan, Alfons himself, and also the late Eric Fuller. He designs puzzles that can be very very complex and difficult to solve but also creates easier designs that have something very interesting and fun. Most puzzlers enjoy a nice burr but don't enjoy extremely high level versions. Jakub, Simona and the team always choose puzzles that have something special and fun about them and are not just very difficult high level burrs. The Eyckmans puzzles in this release are perfect examples of this. They are all clever variants of the 6 piece burr which makes them especially interesting to many puzzlers. Dikkop I Started with Dikkop (translated from Dutch to mean Fathead (for obvious reasons). I initially thought that this one was a rather complex 3 piece burr. It is beautifully made from Wenge, Padauk and Acacia and I was very glad that I picked this one to start with. It's nice and chunky and easy to manipulate the pieces. As soon as I found the first move I realised that what looked like one giant burr piece in each direction was two sticks lying side by side. The "fat heads" prevent the pieces sliding out too easily and do restrict some of the moves. The disassembly takes 15 moves (9.2.2) and is actually a very pleasant exploration. It is a pleasure to work out which move comes next with very few blind ends. It remains stable right to the very last piece being removed which is very gratifying as it means that a beginner puzzler can keep an eye on where pieces are and understand how they lock together all the way through the disassembly. It's really quite clever I then scrambled the pieces and from a combination of my very poor memory and logic, I was able to put it completely back together from scratch. As a result, this is a really nice puzzle for beginners to burrs as well as experts. It will also look very impressive on display. Cannonball Made from a very dark and beautifully grained Acacia, this lovely clever 6 piece burr has a captive centre "cannonball" made from a vibrant Purpleheart. This is another puzzle where the sequence is fun to discover and not too difficult to achieve. I found the first move reasonably quickly but struggled for some reason to find the second move. I think it was because of the way that I was holding the puzzle. Once I had found that move the sequence sort of unfolded in front of me and I was able to remove the first piece after 7 moves. The rest came apart quite easily and again was very stable whilst each piece was removed. The cannonball proved to be unexpected shape which did explain why it was held in position so well. Now, that's an odd cannonball I am rubbish at burr assembly but was able to put this back together from memory whilst the pieces were arranged in the order that I took them out of the puzzle. Once I had arranged them for the above photo, I had lost track of what went where and how they went together. I was now unable to put it back together (at least there was no time for me to do it before having to write about them) so a BT file was used. I do actually think that anyone who is reasonable at burrs should be able to assemble this from pieces with a bit of thought. I plan to try and do it myself when I have finished working on the rest of the batch. Hollow 15 Hollow 15 is a really interesting 6 piece board burr which is a huge step in difficulty from the Dikkop and Cannonball. This is probably less good for beginners but is great fun for the more experienced burrista. Entirely made from a really lovely Acacia, the whole point of this is that the centre of the puzzle is empty and after just a few moves, you can see inside at how everything is interlocked. The interesting thing here is that two of the boards are formed as complete rings with no gaps and the others have small gaps in one edge. The trick will be to move the pieces far enough apart from each other to make space for the gaps to be aligned and unlock them form each other. I found the early moves with very little difficulty but after a few moves, a whole lot more are opened up as possibilities and the puzzle pieces get extended further and further away from each other. This makes it rather hard to keep control of them as some of the seem to want to rotate or sag depending on how you are holding it. I suspect there might be a rotational shortcut somewhere in this puzzle but I was very careful to avoid rotations. After a few moves, I realised how complex this was going to be and I started using my usual to and fro technique to try and keep track of what I had done. Once I was about 6 or 7 moves in, a whole lot of movement suddenly became possible and after wandering up one pathway, I found I couldn't find my way back to the beginning - GULP! No option other than to continue my exploration. Luckily at this point the puzzler can see everything that is going on inside and can try to plan a move or two ahead. I did get stuck for a while when I couldn't find a needed move and realised that it was because the fit of the pieces was so exact that I needed to align them absolutely perfectly to achieve the required move. After I realised this progression was steady and fun until the first pair came out. It did sort of collapse at this point but still well entangled. The separation of the last four pieces was still fun but needed a bit of control. The pieces look simple but they are not This is a very impressive puzzle to disassemble and once you see all the pieces, it is very impressive that the Pelikan team have managed to create it with such perfect accuracy. With a construction like this even a tiny error in the angles will result in an impossible to move puzzle but this is simply perfect. The name Hollow 15 comes from the fact that it requires 15 moves to take out the first piece (level 15.2.4.3.3). I definitely needed Burrtools to reassemble this one and I suspect that the vast majority of you will as well. Luckily making the BT file is great fun. Poolster Poolster is the final puzzle by Alfons in the release by Pelikan. Made using Merbau (aka Borneo Teak) and Movingui (aka Nigerian Satinwood), it really confused me when it first arrived. I could not tell what it was as on arrival the pieces with square holes had all slid outwards by one voxel making the puzzle look rather frightening. I then realised what had happened and squeezed them all together to achieve the correct shape that you can see above. I initially thought that the centra sticks were a captive 3 piece burr but quickly realised that each central cube protruding from one face is connected by a complex arrangement to the square on the opposite face. There is a lot of movement possible from the beginning with this puzzle and it will require a systemic approach to ensure that you try each set of possibilities as far as they can go before backtracking to the beginning and trying another one. I found the reinforcing dowels quite useful in keeping track of which pieces I had moved and in which direction. The puzzle remains remarkably stable through the initial exploration and removal of the first couple of pieces (level 10.10.7.2). After that it becomes easier as you can see everything that is happening inside. Once in pieces the impressive nature of the design and the craftsmanship becomes very apparent. Perfect alignment to make this one workI think that very few puzzlers will be able to assemble this from scratch but I would be interested to hear if any of you manage this. I needed to resort to Burrtools again but it's a fun one to put together. Like Hollow 15, this is probably best for more experienced puzzles but if you like to collect variants of the 6 piece burr then this is a good one for you. https://www.puzzlemad.co.uk/2026/08/an-epic-eyckmans-extravaganza.html

Perplexing Packing from Pelikan Minima Ronde 333 & 444 cubes Apteek The pressure is on! I managed to dismantle 4 burrs by Alfons coming up soon from Pelikan last week and had 3 left to solve for this week's blog post. I knew this was going to be a hell of a challenge as 2 of them were by the amazing Dr Volker Latussek and one by Lucie Pauwels. Packing puzzles are definitely not my strong point and these two designers are particularly skilled. Minima Ronde Minima Ronde by Volker Latussek I had to start with the Minima - I adore this whole series and actually think I have almost every one made. Considering Volker had not been certain about designing Minima puzzles initially, he has taken the idea to new heights with some incredible designs and this one is definitely one of the most fun ones I have ever played with. Jakub and team have made this one with a wonderful set of accurately cut Wenge pieces and a beautifully grained Oak box. The basic premise of the Minima series is to have a 2x2x3 box to be packed with relatively simple pieces in such a way that the holes in the walls always end up filled. The interior may not be and the need for interesting rotations is often part of the fun but not always. Volker has taken this simple idea here with packing pieces that are just 2 voxels in volume but spread over a 3 voxel space with the use of diagonal cuts across one of them. Here is what Volker said about this design: "MINIMA FOR FREDERIC was actually meant to mark the end of my foray into the world of MINIMAs. Over the last few months, I’ve been playing once again with one of my favourite building blocks: this is the complete set of fourteen building blocks, each consisting of a cube and a second cube that is cut diagonally into two parts, with each half glued across its entire surface to the cube. Accordingly, the building blocks in this set each have the volume of a bicube. Twelve of these blocks uniquely fill a 3x4x2 box (TOUR), nine fill a 3x3x2 box (GIRO) and six fill a MINIMA box (3x2x2). Years ago, I designed a ‘put-together’ puzzle for Pelikan’s RONDE using five pieces. Naturally, I now wanted to find out which building blocks could be used to fill a MINIMA box and provide it with suitable openings." Oh boy! He has really provided us with a puzzle where the openings are crucial and used in different ways. It arrives in a special configuration (as almost all of his puzzles do) which gives a tiny hint of what might be coming up for the intrepid puzzler. Most of the pieces come out through the large 2x1½ voxel hole in the top surface but one of them is blocked and needs a bit of rotational fiddling to be released. As usual, the initial challenge is to make the cuboid shape that will fit (this time the cavity will be completely filled. The handedness of the pieces means that you have to be careful which position they are placed in. I quickly realised that the arrival position had the 4 pieces with bevels at 90º to each other would form a cube and then the straight-line pieces would have to be used as a sort of length extender. The straight-line pieces lengthen the sides Having realised this I made a cuboid of the correct size and then discovered that I could make 2 of them with mirror configurations. Time to pick one and then work out which of the 8 possible positions it could possibly be paced inside. I started with a brute force trial and error approach and very quickly realised that, due to the needed rotation(s) I was going to have to be more systematic and actually apply logic and thought©. The 4 single voxel holes in the box were going to have to be there for a purpose - Volker NEVER places anything unnecessarily - everything has a use. Working backwards, I Started with a shape that would allow the last(first) piece to be removed(placed). I searched for orientations of the cuboid that then had the possibility of either a second piece removal straight away or would utilise the holes for movements. At this point I had a fabulous Aha! moment and found a wonderful sequence that made lots of space inside the box. Now, it was time to work out how to place the pieces sequentially to allow that wonderful sequence to occur. Here is the challenge - the pieces don't just fit inside easily, there are multiple rotations involved (one in particular is absolutely incredible - Ronde means a round dance and that is exactly what you will have to do with this one. I don't think I have seen a Minima do that before. It took me an hour or so to find the required moves but eventually I reversed all my earlier moves and packed the pieces inside. Absolutely incredible! This is one of the most fun and rewarding Minima puzzles that I have ever worked on. The solution is completely unique, totally logical and beautiful to perform. A little dexterity is needed to control all the moves but it is fun. BUY IT! IT'S AMAZING! 333 & 444 Cubes 333 & 444 Cubes by Lucie Pauwels This lovely little challenge by Lucie arrives as an interlocked set of pieces that form a cube with a lump on the top - obviously this is not the final placement of the pieces. This has been made using Maple and a brilliantly vibrant Jatoba. The precision is perfect. I removed the pieces to examine them and realised that the name of the puzzle came from the fact that the pieces could all fit together to form a 4x4x4 cube or the Maple pieces alone would form a 3x3x3 cube. I made the simpler assembly first and enjoyed that - a nice little warmup for the main puzzling. 4x4x4 and a 3x3x3 Creating the fully packed 4x4x4 is a clever challenge which reminded me a little of the Swan Cube from an earlier Pelikan release - the holes in the faces of the larger cube would need to be filled and this would need careful planning as they got blocked off quite quickly if the wrong piece was placed first. It's not too difficult and is a lot of fun. It could probably be solved by brute force but is better solved by noticing what the shapes will allow you to do and then thinking© about how this should be used in sequence to fill the void in the frame. Assembled shape hidden behind a spoiler button. 444 shape complete Show/Hide Apteek Apteek by Volker Latussek Apteek and FarmaciaThis incredible creation has been made from a deep Purpleheart wood for the box and an incredibly dark and fabulously grained Acacia. It is simply gorgeous. It arrives in a special configuration that Volker deliberately designed - the pieces seem to fit inside the 3x3x3 cavity but the central row is protruding above the surface. Obviously, this needs to be remedied and the pieces rearranged so that the pieces fit flush with the top surface. It's not going to be an easy process as the pieces (five L-triominoes and three L-tetrominoes) each have either a dowel protruding from one of the voxels and a reciprocal hole for accepting them. The box has a single dowel protruding into the top row of the puzzle. This reminded me a lot of a puzzle that I still haven't managed to solve from last year, Farmacia - this is still sitting on my desk waiting for me to complete it. Volker wrote this about it: "As promised, here it is APTEEK. When working with the usual v’s and developing FARMACIA, I had to learn that some very nice moves are not possible. However, from my experience with FILLING V, I know how powerful L’s are. So what could be more obvious than turning four v’s into three L’s and filling the 3x3x3 box together with the remaining five v’s? And suddenly, the previously impossible moves become possible. I really hope that you too will see that the price of losing the simple and clean construction principle of the 9 v’s of FARMACIA is not too high and that the beauty of the APTEEK solution - just as in APOTHECA - justifies the mixture of eight v’s and L’s." Unlike the Farmacia there is no hole in the box to accept a dowel and with the dowel positioned in the top row, I had a funny feeling that this puzzle was going to require rotations to solve it. I spent a good few days trying to make at least a cube shape with the interlocking dowels and holes all fitting together. Interestingly, after many hours I had completely failed to find one. This didn't bode well for solving the puzzle in the box! 😱 Eventually, I resorted to Burrtools. Initially I looked for cube shapes and was slightly horrified to see that there were 7 cubic assemblies and 3 had a single hole that occurred in the correct place were it to be placed inside the box. I will need to assemble each of these cubes and then try the disassembly to see whether I can put one of them in the box. I did recreate the file with the box and found that there are 8 possible assemblies but no solutions. OMG! It will need rotational moves to assemble. Burrtools can only be used to give you a hint as to how it might possibly be assembled but not the actual solution. I have spent several days on this and gotten nowhere so far and also to my horror, I cannot put it back into the transport position either. This is an incredible challenge and best suited to the hardcore packing/interlocking puzzle solver amongst you. Hopefully these will be going on sale within the next week or so. https://www.puzzlemad.co.uk/2026/08/perplexing-packing-from-pelikan.html