Topological puzzles: do it yourself

As you may already know I like a lot topological puzzles, like those from Dimiter Vakarelov (I talked about them in an older post here).

I saw in a book that I have had since quite long time 2 puzzles that seem to be topological.

You can try them at home, no need for expensive things.

They seem impossible, especially the second one...but of course they are solvable :-)

Hope you will have fun. So here we go:

Topological puzzle 1

What you need: a pair of scissors and a rope.

How to do: put the rope through the pair of scissors like in the pictures below:

Then you can either ask a friend to hold the 2 movable ends of the rope (right of the picture) or you can put your feet on it. The purpose is that the end of the rope becomes unusable. Indeed if nobody holds the end of the rope or if there are some marbles at the end, the puzzle becomes easier.

The goal: free the pair of scissors without cutting the rope or your friend because your friend will be useful for the second puzzle below :-)

This is quite challenging, and reassembling it is more difficult...

Even if you know the solution, if you don't pay attention you may create knots.

Topological puzzle 2

What you need: two ropes and a friend

How to do: just follow the picture below, it is easy to understand:

The goal: you have to be freeded without cutting the rope (or your friend). You are not allowed to untie the knots, of course!

Let me know if you have tried those topological puzzles and share your feeling about them.

You see, puzzles can be quite easy to make, but that does not mean they are easy to solve.

My friends are astonished when I solve them, and when they try to solve them....they fail ;-)

Enjoy !!!

Topological puzzles

I came accross to some new types of puzzles that I did not know before: topological puzzles, here made by Dimiter Vakarelov.

He teaches maths in Sofia (Bulgary) and has been making topological puzzles for years (he also writes books about them)

Those puzzles are hand-made, in metal or wood and with colorful ropes. I like a lot the design with the different shapes, for example the "heart" puzzle, or the "cherries on a stick" puzzle. 

From left to right: "ring on a stick", "cherries on a stick", "spiral-3", "heart", "bracelet"

They are really nice, and they fit well in a collection of puzzles. And Dimiter has made many more topological puzzles. The names of the puzzle fit well to their design.

The goal is to free either the rope (with the balls) or some metal or wooden parts of the puzzle, by moving the rope in a certain way, making it go under some parts of the puzzles...

Most of the time it seems impossible, really !! But there is a solution (of course)!

I managed to solve "ring on a stick" (on the right)...humm how to put it again?...

I managed only to solve one puzzle called "ring on a stick", and I did it by chance...So now I have difficulties to reassemble it...I could cheat by removing the knot under the wooden crital, but I prefer using the "regular" solution.

Note that sometimes there are variation about the "design" of the puzzle, like below with "ring on a stick" puzzle.

At the beginning I feared my puzzle had a problem, but don't worry, there are not any problems! The way you solve it is still the same ;-)

The shape of the stick is not the same, but it has no impact on the solution!

As you may have understood, the difficulty is hard, even really hard. The design of the puzzles is very nice and unusual. And to finish, Dimiter is a really nice guy to chat with.

Support the work of a talented craftman and enjoy his hand-made topological puzzles ;-)

Below are some other examples of his work (there are many!):

"buterfly"

"cobra"

Drop me an email if you want to contact Dimiter.