Apple Tree

Designer: Benjamin Heidt

This puzzle measures: 70 mm x 70 mm x 120 mm

Material: Acacia, Padauk, Am. Walnut

Kevin Sadler wrote about it:

“Here we have another very interesting design by Benjamin Heidt. It is a beautifully burr made in the shape of an Apple tree complete with apples amongst the foliage. It has been stunningly created using American Walnut, Acacia with Padauk apples. This takes a bit of fiddling and exploration in every direction to find the first piece to move and after this, if you’re anything like me, it’s followed by an “Oh my God!!!” moment as all of a sudden a whole LOT of pieces move in various directions. Slight panic ensued and I quickly decided to return to the beginning and discovered that it wouldn’t go – aaargh! It took a frantic few minutes to sort of scrunch it back together and breathe a sigh of relief. I had to gird myself before trying again. This is fun! For me it’s a puzzle version of a rollercoaster. Having done that several times and worked out how it locked and unlocked, I proceeded to explore and quickly found that several pieces were removable. I kept them in a place where I could tell the position and orientation. After removing 4 or 5 the trunk fell off and it sort of scrunched up again. I was lost! Despite this, the puzzle remained pretty stable even if everything was jiggly. I actually struggled to remove the remaining pieces, they did not just fall apart. Over the next 20 minutes I gradually disassembled it piece by piece and, oh boy, there are a lot of pieces. After all of that, I had not even done the main challenge! This is not a stunningly designed sequential disassembly puzzle as I alluded to above…it is actually an assembly puzzle – the tree, as received, is in a “transport configuration” – the actual aim of the puzzle is to assemble the tree again but with 3 red apples on each side of the tree. There is no way that I was going to reassemble the transport solution without assistance let alone the main challenge and so I am off to Burrtools for a happy time sketching pieces out. Great fun!”