Airlock

Designer: Pit Khiam Goh

This puzzle measures: 160 mm x 120 mm x 22 mm

Material: Wenge, Acacia, Mahogany, Purpleheart, Maple, Ash, Acrylic

Kevin Sadler wrote about it:

“Pit is an incredible designer – I have seen his puzzles do very well in the design competitions and I have a good few of his designs in my collection which have appeared in this blog. This one is wonderful as well because of a series of really nice Aha! moments. I had been certain that I had seen this somewhere before but a search of the internet only found a few pictures that did not ring any bells. It is a tray packing puzzle with a restricted entry hole. It has been beautifully made by the Pelikan team from Wenge, Purpleheart, Mahogany, Maple and Limba with an acrylic grille over the top. The delivery placement is useful to keep the pieces together and shows that certain moves will be required. removing the pieces reveals that all the pieces will need rotation and that 2 of the pieces are really quite restricted in how they move and can be placed.

The aim is to place them all back in the tray without any of them appearing in the entry hole and this is a real challenge. I started with this because it looks so enticing and I was hoping would not be too horrendously difficult. My solving success the last couple of weeks has not been great and I wanted something to boost my confidence. Erm… whilst I did solve it, it was not a quick easy solve. The pieces can conveniently be placed on top of the grille for planning purposes and it quickly becomes apparent that almost everything you try ends up blocked. Planning to get the most awkward pieces out of the way was an interesting challenge and taught me a lot. Random placement will not work for you here. You will need to think© and plan ahead. There are several of these Aha! moments and the solution is delightful. This is a fabulous puzzle that will delight experienced puzzlers as well as newbies alike. I will be taking this to work to torture colleagues and medical students during the day.”