Self-interlocking cubic puzzle

Abstract

The present invention is directed to a spatial logical cubic toy having a total of twenty-four identical toy elements mounted in a self-interlocking manner together with eight identical tetrahedral elements and a central solid core element. The eight exterior right-triangular surfaces of the twenty-four toy elements comprise one surface of the cube. The toy elements rotate and translate about a total of eleven axes, among which eight of the axes are collinear with the diagonals of the cube, and the remaining three axes are mutually perpendicular and normal to the face of the cube and passing through the center of the cubic toy. In a preferred embodiment, the eight exterior triangular surfaces of the toy elements forming a face of the cube are colored by a single color. Six different colors can be chosen for the six faces of the cube. The toy elements can be randomly rotated and translated about the eleven axes resulting in a mixture of all the six colors on the faces of the cube. The object of the puzzle is to rotate and translate the toy elements about the eleven axes to obtain the original position wherein each face of the assembled cube will be of a single color resulting in six different colors for the six faces of the cube. The simplicity provided by self-interlocking elements disclosed here, without any screws nuts bolts or springs facilitate ease of manufacture and assembly of the puzzle described here. Press fitting all the elements described here can easily assemble the puzzle, thus reducing the cost of assembly.

1 - 12 . (canceled)  
   
   
       13 . A self-interlocking mechanism for a puzzle in the shape of a cube whose exterior surface is defined by twenty-four wedges, each including two exposed right isosceles triangular faces disposed at a right angle to each other to define a portion of an edge of the cube extending from a respective corner to the mid point of said edge; maintaining said wedges in an assembled array whereby they may be permuted by rotations of two types about seven axes each disposed on one side of eleven distinct planes, one type being the rotation of the group of six wedges lying on one side of any plane that contains an equilateral triangle defined by three vertices of the cube about a vertex axis by some integer multiple of 120°, and the other type being the rotation of the group of twelve wedges lying on one side of any plane parallel to and midway between an opposite pair of faces of the cube about a face axis by some integer multiple of 90°; the exposed faces of said wedges being colored in a pattern which may be scrambled and unscrambled by a series of such rotations.