This is a famous puzzle designed by Stewart Coffin 40 years ago. Wood copies must be made with great accuracy and have become sought-after collectors items selling for several hundred dollars. This leads to the current state of affairs where many people have never even seen this excellent puzzle. I had never seen one, so I exported the pieces from BurrTools and printed out a copy. Now anyone can order an inexpensive copy of this puzzle.

Six pieces, all different, assemble into a cube with side 32mm or about 1.25 inches.

For some reason Shapeways has been unable to dye this model, although as you see I was able to dye it myself with no problems. Thus the model is only available now in Polished White, Strong and Flexible.

BurrTools STL export parameters: Unit Size: 8.0, Bevel: 0.2, Offset: 0.0, Wall Thickness: 1.0, Tubes size: 0.0

Four pieces assemble into an octahedron using coordinate motion. Made from 19 rhombic dodecahedrons. The "child" is the locking piece - a small tetrahedron. The assembled puzzle is 5cm or 2 inches tip to tip.

Three puzzle pieces made from (truncated) rhombic dodecahedrons assemble into a cube-like shape. Assembly is confusing and the three pieces mutually block one another. In fact, assembly is impossible with rigid pieces.
The name derives from the fact that these three pieces just don't want to go together. Like the atomic nucleus, once assembly is accomplished the pieces are locked tightly together. Getting them apart is actually not so easy either. This puzzle will test the limits of "strong, white and flexible". Warning: some force is required for assembly.

Two mirror image pieces assemble into a hollow polyhedron with curved faces. The final shape is the solid defined by the intersection of three cylinders at right angles, sometimes called a Steinmetz solid or tricyclinder. I call it a Pillowhedron, in reference to Stewart Coffin's Pennyhedron Puzzle which inspired it. This puzzle is surprisingly difficult to take apart. This version is printed in three colors.

The color sandstone works nicely for this puzzle. The fit is quite tight off the printer, I had to rub the joining faces together a bit to get it together. Then it goes together with a snap (literally). Definitely not trivial to get it apart, as the colors help to confuse the issue, and the joints are fairly well hidden.

This puzzle is the size of a ping-pong ball (4cm diameter). Play with this puzzle over a carpet because a drop onto a hard floor will chip or break the pieces.

A box packing puzzle invented by Leonard Gordon more than 25 years ago. Originally devised from pieces made from joined spheres, here I use truncated rhombic dodecahedra or edge beveled cubes. The eight pieces are identical and sized so that they fit in a golf ball case.

Four of the pieces can also be interlocked to form a truncated tetradedron. This is a second puzzle, called "Blossom".

Golf ball case box on amazon.com.