ages Brian Young Sequential Discovery Burr

A sequential discovery puzzle that looks like a burr designed by Brian Young at Mr Puzzle.

This photo is the actual puzzle we are selling. It was never sold originally and then forgotten about in my shed.

I’ve done the first few important step and there’s no issues with the puzzle. Its been in my woodworking room the whole time so humidity controlled.  Its brand new so maybe I had just put it away for someone then forgot about it. I sometimes do that but I really cannot remember.

Size: 110mm x 110mm x 110mm
Materials: The puzzle is made of Queensland Silky Oak & Western Australian Jarrah wood and includes magnets and brass parts.
I’ve printed a solution and included it with the puzzle.

Original text from our website way back then below.  And general information about payment and shipping below that. 

Original Text from Mr Puzzle website:

The ultimate goal is to find the piece of Australiana inside the puzzle.

At the end of the solve you will find a small compartment that holds a piece of Lightning Ridge opal. Don't get your hopes up, whilst it is a small piece of genuine opal from the Lightning Ridge opal field, the compartment is small and it's not the Aurora Australis!

Looking for a simple puzzle you can solve easily? This is not going to be it.
Looking for a quick solve? That's not going to happen.

This may not be the hardest puzzle in the world but if you think about the Coming of Age MkII combined with the SMS Box with fewer pieces and fewer tools. You have it!

The puzzle has trick locks, tools, elements of sequential discovery but essentially it's a very hard burr puzzle. If you're looking for a walk in the park don't buy this one.

Brian has included ideas in this puzzle that he's never seen in a puzzle before. Solving a new puzzle often draws on previous puzzle-solving experiences so having lots of puzzles in your collection can be a big help. But the inclusion of ideas not seen before instantly bumps up the difficulty a lot.

The puzzle is called ages. Why?

Even though Brian had always designed his burr puzzles in his head he has found BurrTools to be an amazing tool to help with analysing and refining the design.
But when he first plugged some pieces into BurrTools to check for solutions Andreas Röver's wicked sense of humour was immediately obvious. Time left: ages
In fact, the full analysis of the selection of pieces has never been completed in BurrTools. Time left: unknown -> days -> years -> millennia -> ages Who knows how long it might take?  Once he found a few designs with more than 30 moves to remove the first piece he thought that would be enough.

The design of the puzzle was first started in 2010, a whole year before IPP31 in Berlin, plenty of time to design what was going to be the Berlin Beer Burr.

Brian then hit upon the idea for the Houdini puzzle and Berlin being where Houdini performed the famous Torture Cell act it just seemed the right time to make that puzzle and that it should be given in the Berlin IPP31 exchange and as a result, the Berlin Beer Burr (now named ages) got shelved.

So Brian's had plenty of time to revisit and redesign the original burr and that process seems to have taken ages right? Yet another reason for the name.

This is not a binary burr even if it seems to have some of the elements. All the moves are random. That makes it less predictable to solve. And the burr has no frame; even the Coming of Age MkII pieces are technically making a frame which is how they can get so many moves. But how to get so many moves without a frame and still keep it stable while you play with it? Brian thinks he has done that here.

The first burr piece can be removed without any rotational moves but things are not so straightforward after that. Although Brian has left some rotational moves in the puzzle there is definitely no force required to rotate them so if it's a tight fit then it probably isn't meant to rotate. More than half the pieces have been strengthened with splines but don't forget this puzzle is made of wood, not metal so no undue force, please.

All tools have been provided to do this puzzle. No external tools and no hitting is required.

Brian's favourite puzzles have always been high-level burrs. He created the Coming of Age MkII in 2000 because he liked the mystery of where multiple steps can lead you; towards a solution or to a complete dead-end from which you must then navigate back. Similar to a sequential discovery puzzle where you step towards the solution. It's just that with sequential discovery there is the added dimension of tools.

General Information:

This is Brian Young from Mr Puzzle in Australia selling.  If you have any questions you can email me separately via our Mr Puzzle email address mrpuzzle@mrpuzzle.com.au  But please don’t email and ask to discontinue the auction. All auctions will run their duration. It’s the fairest course for everyone.

All prices in Australian Dollars (not US Dollars).  We much prefer payment via Wise or other bank transfer. PayPal is also possible.

After the auction please message me to let me know if you would like standard or express postage. Rates below. Then I will send an invoice including postage (and tariff for US buyers). 

If you buy more than one item I will be happy to combine ship and quote postage based on exact weight. Usually unless a very heavy puzzle is involved it won’t be much different to the single item below.

Cost to post this puzzle Express:
Australia 20.00 - NZ 42.00 - US/Canada/EU/Asia  65.00 - UK/Scandinavia 70.00 - Other countries please request a quote.

Import duties/tariffs are not included in the final price.
The import duty or tariff rate may be different for every country so please check the rate that applies to your own country.

It is usual practice that import duties or tariffs are paid by the buyer at the point of import or delivery in your own country.

USA is the exception. The USA government has mandated that the tariff be paid to them from Australia before we can send the parcel. The tariff percentage may be different depending on where the puzzle was made. 

For this Mr Puzzle puzzle made here in Australia the rate is 10% + Admin fee.