Rubik's Snake
Encyclopedia
A Rubik's Snake is a toy
with twenty-four wedges identically shaped liked prisms, specifically right isosceles triangular prism
s. The wedges are connected, by spring bolt
s, such that they can be twisted, but not separated. Through this twisting the Rubik's Snake can attain positions including a straight line, a ball
(technically a nonuniform concave rhombicuboctahedron
), a dog, a duck, a rectangle, a snake, and many more imaginative shapes and figures.
The snake was invented by Professor Ernő Rubik
, better known as the inventor of the Rubik's Cube
.
The starting point is a straight line with the triangular edges facing towads you, where the 12 prisms of one colour at the bottom are numbered from the left from 1 to 12. The left and the right sloping faces of these prisms are labeled L and R respectively. The four possible positions of the adjacent prism on each L and R sloping face are numbered 0, 1, 2 and 3 (representing the number of twists between the bottom prism and the L or R adjacent prism). The numbering is based on always twisting the adjacent prism towards you: position 1 turns the adjacent blocks towards you, position 2 makes a 90° turn, and position 3 turns the adjacent block away from you. Position 0 is the starting position and therefore isn’t explicitly noted in instructions.
Using these rules, a twist can be simply described as:
But this notation is impractical for manual twisting, because you don’t know in which order the twists occur.
Toy
A toy is any object that can be used for play. Toys are associated commonly with children and pets. Playing with toys is often thought to be an enjoyable means of training the young for life in human society. Different materials are used to make toys enjoyable and cuddly to both young and old...
with twenty-four wedges identically shaped liked prisms, specifically right isosceles triangular prism
Triangular prism
In geometry, a triangular prism is a three-sided prism; it is a polyhedron made of a triangular base, a translated copy, and 3 faces joining corresponding sides....
s. The wedges are connected, by spring bolt
Spring bolt
Roger Rock of Rock Lock Fastening Systems, Inc. invented the Spring Bolt in Spring of 2008. See this website for a video demonstration of the product and it's uses: http://www.bestrailinghardware.com/...
s, such that they can be twisted, but not separated. Through this twisting the Rubik's Snake can attain positions including a straight line, a ball
Ball
A ball is a round, usually spherical but sometimes ovoid, object with various uses. It is used in ball games, where the play of the game follows the state of the ball as it is hit, kicked or thrown by players. Balls can also be used for simpler activities, such as catch, marbles and juggling...
(technically a nonuniform concave rhombicuboctahedron
Rhombicuboctahedron
In geometry, the rhombicuboctahedron, or small rhombicuboctahedron, is an Archimedean solid with eight triangular and eighteen square faces. There are 24 identical vertices, with one triangle and three squares meeting at each. Note that six of the squares only share vertices with the triangles...
), a dog, a duck, a rectangle, a snake, and many more imaginative shapes and figures.
The snake was invented by Professor Ernő Rubik
Erno Rubik
Ernő Rubik is a Hungarian inventor, architect and professor of architecture. He is best known for the invention of mechanical puzzles including Rubik's Cube , Rubik's Magic, Rubik's Magic: Master Edition, Rubik's Snake and Rubik's 360....
, better known as the inventor of the Rubik's Cube
Rubik's Cube
Rubik's Cube is a 3-D mechanical puzzle invented in 1974 by Hungarian sculptor and professor of architecture Ernő Rubik.Originally called the "Magic Cube", the puzzle was licensed by Rubik to be sold by Ideal Toy Corp. in 1980 and won the German Game of the Year special award for Best Puzzle that...
.
Structure
The 24 prisms are aligned in row with an alternating orientation (normal and upside down). Each prism can adopt 4 different positions each with an offset of 90°. Usually the prisms have an alternating color.Twisting instructions
The description of an arbitrary shape or figure can be described using a set of instructions for twisting the prisms.The starting point is a straight line with the triangular edges facing towads you, where the 12 prisms of one colour at the bottom are numbered from the left from 1 to 12. The left and the right sloping faces of these prisms are labeled L and R respectively. The four possible positions of the adjacent prism on each L and R sloping face are numbered 0, 1, 2 and 3 (representing the number of twists between the bottom prism and the L or R adjacent prism). The numbering is based on always twisting the adjacent prism towards you: position 1 turns the adjacent blocks towards you, position 2 makes a 90° turn, and position 3 turns the adjacent block away from you. Position 0 is the starting position and therefore isn’t explicitly noted in instructions.
Using these rules, a twist can be simply described as:
- Number of the downward-facing prism (from the left): 1 to 12
- Left or right sloping side of the prism: L or R
- Position of the twist: 1, 2 or 3
| Example Figure | Twisting Instructions |
|---|---|
| Three Peaks 6R1-6L3-5R2-5L3-4R2-4L1-1R1-3L3-3R2-7L2-7R3-8L1-8R2-9L1-9R2-10L3-12R3-11L1-10R2 |
|
 |
Cat 9R2-9L2-8L2-7R2-6R2-6L2-5L3-4L2-3R2-2R2-2L2 |
Machine processing
The position of the 23 turning areas can also be written directly after each other. Here the position 0, 1, 2 and 3 are always based on the degree of twist between the right-hand prisms relative to the left-hand prism, if you look at the axis of rotation from the right.But this notation is impractical for manual twisting, because you don’t know in which order the twists occur.
- for example Three Peaks
- 10012321211233232123003
- for example Cat
- 02202201022022022000000
Fiore method
Rather than numbers Albert Fiore uses letters to refer to the direction the second (rightward) section is turned in relation to the first (leftward) section: D, L, U, and R. These are listed consecutively rather than numbered, so that a completely straight figure rather than being presumed as a starting point is notated DDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD.Mathematics
The number of different shapes of the Rubik's Snake is at most 423 = 70 368 744 177 664 (≈ 7×1013), i.e. 23 turning areas with 4 positions each. The real number of different shapes is lower since some configurations are spatially impossible (because they would require multiple prisms to occupy the same region of space). Peter Aylett computed via an exhaustive search that 13 535 886 319 159 (≈ 1×1013) positions are possible when prohibiting prism collisions, or passing through a collision to reach another position; or 6 770 518 220 623 (≈ 7×1012) when mirror images (defined as the same sequence of turns, but from the other end of the snake) are counted as the one position.See also
- Mechanical puzzles
- Combination puzzlesCombination puzzlesA combination puzzle, also known as a sequential move puzzle, is a puzzle which consists of a set of pieces which can be manipulated into different combinations by a group of operations. The puzzle is solved by achieving a particular combination starting from a random combination...
- Nonplanar flexagons
External links
- Official Rubik's Online Site
- Collection of shapes and figures of Rubik's Snake
- glsnake - open-source cross-platform implementation of Rubik's Snake (also ported to XScreenSaverXScreenSaverXScreenSaver is a collection of about two hundred free screensavers for Unix and Mac OS X computers. It was created by Jamie Zawinski in 1992 and is still maintained by him....
)