Heavy Lifter

Designer: Girish Sharma

This puzzle measures: 60 mm x 60 mm x 60 mm

Material: Zebrano, Acacia, Wenge, Maple, Massaranduba

Girish Sharma wrote about it:

“Over the last few months, I have been tinkering with the idea of high level 4x4x4 IC which form a full visible cube. So far, I’ve known the highest level to be 11 by a few designers. The challenge I took on myself was to design something with a higher level. This is first of the many designs that I have coming up in future. Heavy Lifter is a level 12.2.2.2 IC with 5 pieces. The puzzle comes disassembled and the goal is to assemble the pieces into a 4x4x4 cube. Once you have assembled the cube, you might realize the importance of the name of the puzzle. This is an interlocking cube and while rotations might be possible, they are not part of the solution and should be avoided.”

Kevin Sadler wrote about it:
“This wonderful interlocking 4x4x4 cube puzzle is by the amazing Girish Sharma. It has been stunningly produced in some lovely woods – Zebrano, Acacia, Wenge, Maple and Massaranduba. It has been incorrectly assembled for transport and quickly comes apart into 4 rather complex shapes and an L. I did not receive any instructions and from the start assumed that it was a TIC. As a result, I set to work looking for the position of all the pieces and then rotational moves to get them interlocked. The process took me about an hour whilst watching TV with Mrs S. It was really very satisfying to work it out and seat the pieces into place. I was so delighted that I did it repeatedly that evening. 
 
The following day I got my instructions from Jakub and was stunned to realise that it was not meant as a TIC… Amazingly, it was actually an interlocking cube very similar to many of the wonderful Microcubology puzzles I bought way back at the beginning of my puzzling odyssey but MUCH MUCH tougher. The following evening, I just had to try again and do it without the rotations. This was a huge challenge as the TIC part had given me some preconceived ideas that I needed to get rid of. Girish has created an absolute monster of an interlocking cube which is absolutely wonderful to work on. The “proper solution” took me well over an hour and was joyous – this might well be my absolute favourite of the bunch.”