This puzzle is designed by Erhan ubukcuoglu 2012Istanbul /TURKEY

This puzzle design is public domain. You can make, modify, share, produce or sell as you wish.

You can copy, share or publish this document without changing this page and document content.

For more puzzles my puzzle bloghttp://diypuzzles.wordpress.com/

This document can contain dangerous operations or some mistakes. Everything is your own risk. I am not responsible for any damage.

If you find mistakes in this document please contact me by email that I correct them for you and for other people.

Contact informationeacubukcu@yahoo.com

Ball truck

A small truck, a big car and a stainless steel ball. The aim of this puzzle is taking out the steel ball. As you can guess this is a small dexterity puzzle. For me dexterity puzzles are toys. But I like toys and I make also some toys. For this reason making a small dexterity puzzle is a funny project for me.

For this project I used salt shaker. I removed its cap and I obtained a very small jar. The acrylic pipe used for this puzzle is an old empty pen. The pipe is fixed to the cap. Ball truck and car are only moving pieces of this puzzle.If you look closely to the photo you can see a small hole on the truck. For taking out the ball you must use this truck and the car. The trick of the puzzle is very simple but require a lot of patience. I am sure you find

how to take out the ball.

Making your own ball truck puzzle

If you like make your own puzzle you can make easily according to this photo. I will explain here how I made this puzzle. This is not a ready recipe to cook because for making the puzzle you can find exactly same jar with me. For this reason according to my craft tips you can find your own dimensions and you can make easily your own puzzle.

First I will explain solution.

Step 1: You will align back side of the truck to one side of the jar. Your jar is round. The back of the truck is straight. For this reason only two back edge of the truck will touch to the jar, but this is not important. You will load the ball to the truck

Step 2: You will align blue car and red car as seen on the drawing.

Step 3: You will turn your jar slowly in correct direction about 92-93 degree. Because of the friction between truck and car you can take easily the ball out. Additionally the acrylic pipe has 1 mm

clearance with the height of the truck and this pipe support the truck.

As you can see the solution isn't difficult. I guess, with a little patience you can take out the ball in less than 20 minute.

Craft tips for your own puzzle

I started to this project with a small salt shaker.

My jar diameter is about 50 mm (2 inch)My jar height is about 65 mm (2.5 inch)

First I decided for stainless steel ball

My ball diameter is 6 mm

After I found an old empty pen according to my ball diameter. The inside diameter of the pen must be a little bigger than the ball diameter.

My pen inside diameter is about 6,5 mmMy pen outside diameter is about 8 mm

I made the cap from two piece of wood. nside pieces is pine (clear color wood). Thickness 10 mm and Diameter is equal to jar entrance inside diameter. ( about 44 mm). I draw a with a compass and I cut it with a scroll saw. After I drilled to the center of it a 8mm hole. This is the pen outside diameter. I fixed the pen inside of this hole with two component epoxy glue.

I cut the pencil about 5 mm longer than I need. Because I cut it to real dimension after preassembly.

The second pieces is made of 6 mm mahogany. Only for decorative purpose. I cut it also with a scroll saw and I rounded all edges by sanding. I drilled a 6.5 mm hole which is 0.5 mm bigger than the ball diameter.

After preparing piece 1 and piece 2, I glued them together.

Finding dimensions for car and truck

At the left you can see top view of the car and truck in solution position.You can make a similar drawing and you can find your own dimensions. The important point in this position, the ball must be in the center of the jar.My example dimensions for car is about 10x10x30 mmMy example dimensions for truck is about 10x10x25 mm

After preparing everything but them in the jar, cut your pipe carefully to the final length and fix the cap to the jar with a hot glue or two component epoxy glue.You are ready to play.

Ball and cube

This is my second dexterity puzzle project with a little trick. They sell spice shakers as a couple for salt and pepper and I decided to make this puzzle for the second jar. This time in the jar, there are only a cube and a ball. On the cube there is a hole that the ball can enter inside it. This puzzle has a shorter acrylic pipe. But on the pipe of this puzzle there is a hole shaped like a key hole.

You can guess the solution easily. But require a little dexterity.

If you like make your own puzzle, this puzzle is exactly same with my first dexterity puzzle Ball truck. For this reason I added some craft tips and solution to same document. I advise first reading Ball truck

SOLUTION

First you will turn the puzzle upside down.After by using one side of the jar you must upload the ball into the cube.By knocking the jar with your finger you must align the cube to the face of the slot. The cube must be centered with slot and must be parallel to pipe. After you turn the jar very very slowly until the ball fall to the slot.When the ball fall to the slot, it goes suddenly to the big hole and fall into the pipe.At this moment you must change the inclination of the jar and take out the ball. (if you don't change the inclination of the jar, the ball will fall into the jar again from other open end.)

Craft tips for making your own puzzle

This puzzle is very similar to ball truck. For this reason I will explain only differences for making your own.

For this puzzle I used a 6 mm stainless steel ball and 10x10x10 mm wooden cube.

If you like you can make a small slot to one side of the cube for easily loading and unloading the ball. You can decide for this after a few play test.

The tricky part of this puzzle is acrylic pipe. I made it from an old ball pen. You can make it from any pipe that you like. (see ball truck)

For 6 mm ball I drilled a 3,5 mm hole to cap side and 6.5 mm hole to the other side of the pipe. A and B distances must be same with cube diameter. For this project 10 mm (maybe 0.5-1 mm smaller)

Connecting 3,5 and 6.5 mm holes and making a slot on a small acrylic pipe is difficult. You can make by using a hand power tool like Dremell or Proxxon (or other similar tools)

I hope you like this puzzle