Hey Twisty Puzzlers,

Engineering school is as crazy as ever (11 weeks left as an undergrad!), so even the stickering of this puzzle has been spread out over the last two weeks. In any case, the puzzle finally done, so I'm happy to present...

The True Master Helicopter Cube
Video!

When I first presented the Master Helicopter Cube in August 2010, people told me that what I had really made was a Master Curvy Copter. So finally, here is a True Master Helicopter Cube. The inner layer cut is completely flat, and the outer layer cut is as close to flat as I could make it without cutting pieces off.

I designed this puzzle on SolidWorks, printed it in the WSF material at Shapeways, dyed it using Rit Dye, and stickered it with Mefferts high-quality vinyl that I cut on my university's laser cutter.

For Andreas:
Edge length = 75mm
Weight = (I will weigh it between classes tomorrow)

The Master Helicopter Cube and the Master Curvy Copter are now available on Shapeways as DIY kits. By popular demand, I have made them available in WSF ($180), BSF ($205), and WSF Polished ($205). When you order, please send an email with your order number to "eitanspuzzleshop @ gmail . com" (without spaces). Be sure to indicate which one you bought.

I will be emailing Oliver the sticker layout tomorrow.

Enjoy the rest of the pictures!



Copyright 2012 - Eitan Cher

Nice work, look's nice .

Wow. Amazing puzzle. It seems to turn very well, however I would prefer a flat side version...

Beautiful puzzle! I would by your puzzle on Shapeways for $180.

Awesome puzzle Eitan! I've been eager to see this one since you mentioned it. It looks absolutely brilliant. I for one would also strongly consider buying one at the mentioned price. It feels like tone of those puzzles that must be in a collection.

Wow this would be really fun to solve.

Nice puzzle Eitan! Those stickers look tricky to apply - my stickers for the Tardis cube will be easy in comparison!
Depends on your derfintion of "fun"

WOW! This one is just amazing! Must be very complex to solve it~

Looks awesome!
Just a small nitpick (which hopefully won't degrade to another naming debate): going from the 3-layered Helicopter, shouldn't a 'true' True Master Helicopter have one layer less, aka 4 layers (aka Little Chop + Helicopter Cube)?

Beautiful puzzle. I'm really glad to see this. The only issue I had with the Master Curvy Copter is that I couldn't play with it so I'm glad they may be a chance to fix that problem . I especially like that 1) Gelatinbrain doesn't have an equivalent and 2) I'm not sure how to solve it. I'd definitely buy it at the $230 price.

I can't believe what I'm seeing! I love the fluorescents-it really brings the beauty of the puzzle out. This would be an interesting solve. I would buy one at that price range!

Curious... how did you get your name/logo onto the stickers? That looks like a very nice touch. As for putting in on Shapeways... PLEASE do. I can't afford it right away but I really would like the option to get this down the road.

Carl

So would I, but I am pretty sure that it can't be done without losing the little squares in the middle. The mechanism is very close to the surface on those as it is, so making it flatter would slice the faces right off.
Probably right, but let's not go there until we have to.
I sent an email to the comments address for gelatinbrain on this subject exactly. I hope he can make it happen!
I use the laser cutter in its "rastering" mode before cutting out the shape. That's how I've always done it, and I'm not sure what I'll do next year if my graduate school doesn't have a laser cutter.

Thanks, everyone!

-Eitan

Nice nice puzzle! I too was one of those asking for a true Master Helicopter Cube.
Thank you for making this!
I will love to own one in the future. I can't promise you when, but I deffinatly want one.

That, my friend, is awesome.

Eh - wow!
Fantastic.
Tell me, when it's available on your Shapeways shop. The price is absolutely OK.
I will order one (please make it available also as WSF polished, no worries about the higher price).
What else shall I say?

Frank

WSF polished does not work very well if the pieces are very small with detailed designs. It's OK only for large flat surfaces, in my experience.

If you ask me the meaning of the term "Master" in the name of a twisty puzzle is so convoluted as to be almost meaningless. If you look at the skewb (order=1 deep cut puzzle) and the master skewb (order=2) or the pentultimate (order=1 deep cut puzzle) and the master pentultimate (order=2) you come to the conclusion that "master" means the next highest order puzzle which is deep cut as much as possible. Note a shallower cut master skewb would be the Dino Cube or a shallower cut master pentultimate could be a megaminx. By this logic the 3x3x3 should be the Master Cube. Since the Helicopter Cube is already order=2 (two cut planes per axis of rotation) it could be considered a shallower cut verion of the true Master Edge Turn Cube already...

IMHO,
Carl

@wwwmwww I agree. Professor helicopter cube?

Is there something (technically or obligatory) stopping you from releasing the curvy as well?

Cheers,
Burgo.

I'm with you there Burgo.I love both of these but I would prefer the Curvy Chinook!
I have TomZ's mass produced Curvy Copter and it is one of my Desert Island Puzzles.

Hey Everyone,

Nope.

On that note, I would like to announce that starting by the end of this weekend, my Master Curvy Copter Cube and my Master Helicopter Cube will be available on my Shapeways shop. I need to make a quick design change to the Master Curvy Copter, which is why I can't just post them right now. Keep an eye out here and on the YouTube video for the announcement.

Each will be $200 in WSF, or $220 in BSF. At the moment, engineering school will not allow me time to do the dying, assembly, or stickering for people, so I will not be able to offer that service until later, and I will decide on a price at that time.


I'm going to keep the name for now, since there's so much confusion.

-Eitan

Hmm, if we want to discuss this more in general, we should open a new thread.
For the moment: Maybe it's more personal feeling? All my last orders at Shapeways - if offered - had been WSF polished, around 5 or 6 different models. So far none of them was disappointing, but vice versa I enjoyed, that the puzzles did not need any breaking in. And among them there were also puzzles like Tom's 4x5x6 or the Multi-DoDec with a lot of VERY small pieces included. Nearly no dust - just fun.
My experiences are 100% positive - worth the few more bucks.

Frank

I agree with Eitan. These are his puzzles and I'm happy letting him name them what he wants to. A nice clean definition of Master has already been cobbled so this certainly doesn't make things any worse.

Carl

Hey everyone,

The Master Helicopter Cube and the Master Curvy Copter are now available on Shapeways as DIY kits. By popular demand, I have made them available in WSF ($180), BSF ($205), and WSF Polished ($205). When you order, please send an email with your order number to "eitanspuzzleshop @ gmail . com" (without spaces). Be sure to indicate which one you bought.

At the moment, I do not have time to dye, assemble, and sticker puzzles for people. Perhaps this summer I will have time.

I will be emailing Oliver the sticker layouts tomorrow.

Eitan

I know that it would make the puzzle a bit more expensive, but can you extend the faces of the puzzle to make a flatter version?

It's not a matter of cost. It's a matter of pieces not having mechanism to hold them in. I will give it another try sometime, though.

-Eitan

You can now buy stickers for the Master Helicopter Cube and the Master Curvy Copter from Olivér Nagy's sticker shop.

Thanks Olivér!

-Eitan

I'm not sure if I made the question clear enough. I was just wondering if you could extend the faces of the puzzle similar to how Tony Fisher extended the faces of the V-cube 7 so that they were flat. Sorry if you already knew what I meant.

Although the V-Cube 7 has pillowed faces it has planar cuts, so extending to flat faces is possible. On this puzzle the cuts are curvy as well, so there is no way to just extend the pieces to make flat faces. I think!