cross-posted from: https://sh.itjust.works/post/23562018
Mere days after photos of a 35x35 surfaced, Preston Alden has unveiled a 49x49:
It weighs 30 kg, stands 34 cm tall, and consists of 13,827 pieces. Every piece of the cube was 3D printed using PETG plastic (aside from the bolts and springs).
Congratulations to Preston on such an incredible achievement. I’ve never seen olzing on such a large puzzle!
More info on the twistypuzzles forum: https://twistypuzzles.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=39559
Is it even possible for a human to solve that?
Sure it is, it would just take a while. Beyond 6x6 or so, they don’t get more difficult, just more tedious.
How does it not get more difficult? Do the algorithms stay the same regardless of rows?
Do the algorithms stay the same regardless of rows?
Yes, exactly. The same algorithms used to solve a 6x6 can be used to solve an 7x7, or a 10x10, or a 49x49. You just need to repeat them for each layer.
Makes sense. I’ve only ever worked with an original cube
New patterns emerge in a 4x4 compared to a 3x3, and some more new ones show up at 5x5, but after that it’s all the same thing just more layers.
I’d argue that 6x6 centers intoduce some intricacies you don’t see on a 5x5, but beyond that, yeah, it’s pretty much just more of the same.
As an aside, are you subscribed to [email protected]? I’d really like to grow that community.
Even-dimensioned cubes (4x4x4, 6x6x6, …) are harder because they introduce some parity errors. Odd-dimensioned keep their fever center piece in the right spot.
Otherwise the size just makes it more tedious. I keep up with a 4x4x4. I had a gigaminx dodecahedron that I solved a few times, but it just made my hands tired from the weight and kept popping out pieces because of their tinyness.
fever center piece
Typo?
gigaminx dodecahedron
just made my hands tired from the weight and kept popping out pieces
What brand of gigaminx did you have? My old MF8 gigaminx is a bit stiff, but it’s never popped on me. I’ve heard good things about the more modern YuXin and DianSheng ones.
As an aside, are you subscribed to [email protected]? Would be great if we could get more people on there.
What brand of gigaminx did you have?
I can’t recall. It’s been well over ten years. I think I solved it two or three times. It was just tedious. Whatever cheap brand they had on dealextreme at the time.
dealextreme
“Now that’s a name I’ve not heard in a long time…” :)
Whatever cheap brand they had
If I recall correctly, the first brand to release a gigaminx was Cube4You, second was MF8, third was Shengshou. Any of these ring a bell?
MF8 sounds familiar, but I might have had some other puzzles of that brand.
Why bother then?
For record-breaking puzzles like this, the challenge is more in designing and building a functional puzzle. Solving it is comparatively easy, if tedious.
The difficulty would come more in manipulating the individual layers, than the actual mental process of solving it.
I feel like this would be super fragile and internal structures bend a lot with twisting.
Solving it is easy.
It’s the scrambling thats the problem.
Video of this in motion?
Not that I’m aware of so far. I am very curious to see how well it turns.
![[Preston Alden] 49x49 Rubik's Cube](https://sh.itjust.works/pictrs/image/f23a1dd6-f26a-422a-8484-c293bd7783f2.jpeg){kind=link}