The proper dimensions of a hexagon
A new week begins today. The weather turned bad over the last weekend, and yesterday we had heavy rain. But the rain stopped this morning, and by the afternoon, the sky started to clear up. Since the humidity has dropped, I went ahead and attached the sliding key panels on the 3-sun cube box. The day before yesterday, I had already glued one side, and I was waiting to attach the other, but because of the bad weather, I postponed it for a day. Now, the assembly of the 3-sun cube box with 18 steps is complete. If possible, I’d like to move on to the finishing process tomorrow. This time, I’m making two types: one with a traditional checkered pattern and one with natural wood. Since the finishing methods are different for each, I’ll probably need to spend a bit more time on that process tomorrow.
Today, I also made some progress on the hexagonal box (6-steps). I had planned to wait a little longer for the materials to dry, but the panels made from natural wood seemed ready to use, so I decided to start working little by little. As shown in the photo, today I made the top and bottom hexagonal panels and the internal shaft panels. As I mentioned before, I first cut out the hexagonal shapes and then add grooves to them. Each hexagon has grooves on five of its six sides, leaving one side without a groove. That ungrooved side becomes the fixed panel, which is the bottom of the box. Among the five grooves, one of them stops partway instead of going all the way through, and the side with that groove becomes the lid of the box.
It might be a little hard to see in the photo, but just inside the groove—about one millimeter in—I join two panels together to form the curved shaft panel. Since the shaft must fit perfectly inside the groove, I always make it while matching it to the grooves of the hexagonal panels. For example, even a small change in the size of the hexagon can greatly affect the size of the shaft. That’s the reason. Because of this, you can see that the size of this hexagonal puzzle box slightly varies each time it’s made, unlike the square boxes. It’s hard to explain well, but I think of it as a “box made by feeling” rather than one made strictly by measurement. Of course, the mechanism must fit perfectly, but the overall size of the box may differ slightly each time—maybe by about one or two millimeters.In that sense, it can be said that this is a slightly special kind of puzzle box, different from the others.
Today, I also made some progress on the hexagonal box (6-steps). I had planned to wait a little longer for the materials to dry, but the panels made from natural wood seemed ready to use, so I decided to start working little by little. As shown in the photo, today I made the top and bottom hexagonal panels and the internal shaft panels. As I mentioned before, I first cut out the hexagonal shapes and then add grooves to them. Each hexagon has grooves on five of its six sides, leaving one side without a groove. That ungrooved side becomes the fixed panel, which is the bottom of the box. Among the five grooves, one of them stops partway instead of going all the way through, and the side with that groove becomes the lid of the box.
It might be a little hard to see in the photo, but just inside the groove—about one millimeter in—I join two panels together to form the curved shaft panel. Since the shaft must fit perfectly inside the groove, I always make it while matching it to the grooves of the hexagonal panels. For example, even a small change in the size of the hexagon can greatly affect the size of the shaft. That’s the reason. Because of this, you can see that the size of this hexagonal puzzle box slightly varies each time it’s made, unlike the square boxes. It’s hard to explain well, but I think of it as a “box made by feeling” rather than one made strictly by measurement. Of course, the mechanism must fit perfectly, but the overall size of the box may differ slightly each time—maybe by about one or two millimeters.In that sense, it can be said that this is a slightly special kind of puzzle box, different from the others.