More Vinco's! and I'm in trouble again!!

Latest batch of Vinco puzzles

At this moment in time I have a blackened area right between my eyes!!! No it's not dirt! During the week I received another parcel from Vaclav Obsivac (aka Vinco) - this parcel was not expected by the present Mrs S and I became victim of the laser stare!! I swear she has had the power increased! It's true, I probably deserved it - I hadn't actually told her they were coming and my study is now getting out of control! There are puzzles everywhere!

My Precioussssss!

My big problem is she won't let me keep them anywhere else in the house, despite them being beautiful. Every time I place some of my lovelies (preciousssssss!!!) on the coffee table in the living room they miraculously reappear in my study again within a few hours. For this reason I have also bought a Kindle - if I can get rid of my fiction/paperbacks then I will have more space for puzzles!!

So a week ago Vaclav opened his new website and let everyone know that he had more puzzles to post. I received the email at about 11pm and immediately disappeared from the living room to have a look (she wasn't suspicious at that time). The new website is really nice - definitely an improvement and he has really been hard at work designing and building more goodies. In fact there must have been a mad scramble initially because thing were disappearing even as I surfed and something went just as I tried to add it to my cart! I still managed to get some nice stuff - his prices are very reasonable. I do feel slightly guilty as I haven't actually managed to finish all the last batch yet! From the back left: Two U's, Prism halfcubes, Double pyramid, Kiss, Coming of age, Vinco Octahedron. I blame the voices!!!!

I will quickly review two of them that I have done straight away - starting with the Double Pyramid:

Top

Bottom

This is about 64mm high and made of Walnut and Maple. It is just beautiful - everyone I have shown it to has marvelled at the astonishing accuracy of the fit! It is a 4 piece puzzle and is not a coordinate motion puzzle. It is not hugely difficult - the hardest thing is to work out which pieces to hold and which direction to move the pieces in to separate it. Once you have worked this out it just slides apart in one beautiful move to reveal 2 pairs of identical pieces:

4 pieces

Putting it back together again is not hard - at least once you have worked out how to reassemble the pairs and orientate them perfectly for the final slide. Very satisfying!

Next up is a similar puzzle - the Vinco Octahedron:

Vinco Octahedron

This is also 64mm high but looks pretty small because the width is only 45mm. It is absolutely stunning made from variegated Apple wood. Another 4 piece non-coordinate motion puzzle - it has a different mechanism of separating into it's 2 pairs of pieces (different shapes to the first puzzle despite the similarity in the initial shape). This one is slightly harder than the double pyramid because there is only one type of wood and the separating lines are harder to see. Once you have worked it out it quickly separates to these pieces:

Pieces of the Vinco Octahedron

If you get a chance to buy some of these wonderful and beautifully made Objets d'art then do so - they are cheap and Vaclav is a pleasure to deal with.