Puzzle Design Challenge

By: Gia Bautista

Have you ever looked at a product that has been well-designed? Do you find
yourself asking questions such as, How did the designer think of that idea? or
What is involved in the creation of that product? The more you study and learn
about design and how designers create items, you begin to learn certain skills and
knowledge that you can only acquire through experience. Design challenges
provide opportunities to apply skills and knowledge in unique and creative ways.
Taking an idea you have and transferring it from a concept to a sketch, to working
drawings, to models, and then to a working prototype is exciting and fun. It also
entails several steps. When you are a one-person design and build team, the task
of effective communication is rather simple. However, what happens when you
must communicate your ideas to others, or when the responsibility for building a
teams solution falls on someone elses shoulders? This increases the level of
responsibility significantly and requires the development of a complete set of
design documentation in order to communicate effectively.

Define the
Problem:

What problem are you solving?

I am creating a puzzle cube that will give use to wooden

block scraps to help a furniture manufacturing company
make a profit off of the expensive scraps.
List the criteria and constraints.
Must be made of 27 - hardwood cubes
Some parts must interlock
No two parts should be identical
Together, all five parts should form a 2 cube
Must contain 5 parts
Each puzzle piece should have no less than four but
no more than six wooden cubes
The cube should take high school students an average
of 5 10 mins. to solve.
Is the Problem
valid or
justifiable?

Generate
Concepts:

Explain why or why not you believe this is a real problem.

Can you justify it?
Who says it is a problem?
Why do they claim it to be a problem?
What is the problem?
When does this problem happen?
Where does this problem happen?
How does the person vision a possible solution?
Yes creating a puzzle cube is a real problem because
the Fine Office Furniture company needs to make a
profit off of the wood scraps so they do not waste
money. This problem happens at the furniture
company because they need to make accurate
measurements when creating wooden furniture so it
stays consistent. I vision a possible solution by making
the puzzle cube using the wood scraps to create a
product that will make a profit for this company.
How many different puzzle part combinations are there?

There are many combinations; too many to list.

Based on
your data,
create

different
puzzles

Decision Matrix
PuzzleCube 5
Idea
Parts

Part
1

Part
2

Part
3

Part
4

Part
5

Total

1
2

1
2

1
2

2
2

2
2

2
2

9
11

1
1

Explain the value system for each

Key:
I plane = 0, 2 planes= 1, 3 planes= 2
Develop a
Solution:

Explain why the puzzle cube that has the highest value is the
best. Explain why the other puzzle cubes did not measure
up.
PuzzleCube 2 with the highest value is the best because it has more complex
pieces compared to PuzzleCube 1. Since cube 2 has pieces using more
planes, it is harder to figure out compared to cube 1.

Justificatio
n of your
chosen
Puzzle
Cube
design
solution:

I thought Gias puzzle cube was fun and enjoyable to solve.

- Aysha Ahmed
Its colorful and exciting
- Juliet Bier
I enjoyed solving the puzzle cube and it was well designed.
- William Faulkner

Construct and
Test:

Ask at least ten people to solve your puzzle cube. Time them
to see how long it takes them to solve the puzzle. Report the
statistical analysis of the time it takes to solve the puzzle.
Name (age range)
Mom (adult)
Ava (11)
Dad (adult)
Miguel (teen)
Aysha (teen)
Wethny (teen)
Juliet (teen)
Millicent (teen)
Caroline (teen)
Destiny (teen)

Time (mins.)
10
9.77
7.42
2.38
2.35
10
4.12
9.08
10
2.55

Mode (sing)
Mode (mult)
Mean
Median
Range
STDEV.P
STDEV.S

10
10
6.767
8.25
7.65
3.312048
3.491205

A written summary of your puzzle test results and a

discussion of the validity of your design. Does your design
meet the design criteria? Does your design provide an
appropriate degree of challenge to a person who is three
years of age or older (as stated in the design statement)?
From my results, I can say that my puzzle cube appropriately
challenged the target age range. The range of my data (7.65)
was high but within the data from my classmates, who are
pretty much the same age, there was a large gap. This
means that my cube was challenging depending on the
person but overall will entertain most teens for around 7
minutes (my average was 6.767).
Testing the
Solution:
A discussion of possible changes to your puzzle cube that
would improve the design.
If I would change my cube to improve its design, I would
make the pieces interlock better so that it would be sturdier
when it is assembled. This was a problem when the cube
was being transported.
Evaluate the
Design:

Why is it important to
model an idea before
making a final
prototype?

It is important to model an idea before making a final prototype because

making a prototype is different from drawing and designing a model. While
making the puzzle cube prototype, we had to assess the materials
dimensions and make sure they were consistent. If they were not, then our
puzzle cubes would not have the right shapes and the pieces would not work
and fit together. Then our cube would not look like our modeled idea.

Which assembly
constraint(s) did you
use to constrain each
piece of the puzzle to
the assembly such
that it did not move?
Describe each
constraint used and
explain the degrees of
freedom that are
removed when each is
applied between two
parts. You may wish
to create a sketch to
help explain your
description

When putting together the puzzle cube pieces, there were five different
types of constraints I could use: mate, flush, angle, tangent, and insert.
I mostly used the mate constraints so that the faces and vertices would
match up nicely while I assembled my cube in Inventor. When this type of
constraint is applied between two parts, it makes two faces, angles, or
corners on two objects face each other and come together. This eliminates
three of the six degrees of freedom because the objects coming together will
no longer move along the x, y, and z planes and will not rotate on these
planes either.

Based on your
experiences during
the completion of the
Puzzle Design
Challenge, what is
meant when someone
says, I used a design
process to solve the
problem at hand?
Explain your answer
using examples from
the work that you
completed.

When someone says that they used the design process to solve a problem,
this means that they followed each step of the design process. Ultimately,
they thought about the problem and planned multiple solutions, went with
one idea or combined ideas, created a model solution, and evaluated their
solution at the end. I had to define the problem and figure out the design
constraints, design different puzzle cubes, compare the cubes I came up
with, make model cubes, and then evaluate my design to solve the puzzle
cube problem.

What else could the

furniture company do
or make with the
scrap used to make
your puzzle cube?

With the tiny scraps used to make the puzzle cube, the furniture company
would not be able to make anything because there would not be any scraps
used to make my puzzle cube since all of the pieces should be 3/4.
However, I found that when making my cube that the slight variances of the
cubes that were .001 made a difference. These scraps are too small to make
anything out of wood so they would have to be thrown out.