SOMA Crystal
SOMA News 3 April 2010
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A 4 set SOMA figure is large.

March 25 2010
Just as I thought SOMA was fading, I heard from Paulo Brina of Belo Horizonte, Brasil.
The story he told was BIG SOMA

Joining the rest of us, SOMA maniacs, Paulo was tired of the old 7 piece soma, so he began to play Tetra-SOMA, using 4 sets = 28 pieces = 108 cubes.
The pieces
The tetra set, home made, stainless steel
(it's polished, so, it's hard to take photos)

Notice the extreme beauty this polished set exhibits. :o)
As Paulo wrote "It's funny. More possibilities, more complexity."

Lets look at the pictures.


001 bloc 2x7x9 = 126, so we have 18 holes/gaps
.

002 A 5x5x5 cube would make 125,
so we have 17 gaps, 2 are hidden


003 Another 5x5x5 cube, 1 gap hiden

004 Converging stairs


005 Pyramid 9x9 base

006 Perfect pyramid, my masterpiece, i think


007 Another pyramid, and a cube

008 Playing with holes



The following ones Paulo call 'tablet's.
If we make a 9x9 base, we have 27 cubes to arrange in the 2nd level.
But we can hide some gaps, or do not use all the 28 pieces.

009 Only 98 cubes

010 Only 97 cubes


011 These chess-board like are funny
(and usually hard to arrange)

012 A perfect one, 108 cubes,
.


013 There are many many geometrical combinations,
symetrics are harder

014 To get symetry, there is a hiden gap
.


015 Interlaced squares, one of multiple possibilities

016 Another harmonic one


017 Making it a bit more interesting
(where to put the Zs pieces?)

018 Mandalas are hard
.


019 Another mandala

020 Isolated cubes are harder to arrange than in lines.


As you an see, Paulo's figures are indeed wery pretty.
And keep in mind that working with 4 SOMAs is a lot more difficult than a single SOMA.
Actually Paulo makes his figures on paper, and then solve them afterwards.
Solution
This is one of the solutions

Note that the naming system on this drawing is:
Paulo Pieces = Z E W T L V D, Thorleif Pieces = Z A P T L V B

VLTZ    is like the shapes
AB        is like left/right hand (L was used, therefore A-B)
P           is like a pyramid standing on its 3 legs In a puzzle with 4 SOMA sets, we also use the small "z a p t l w b" to avoid confusion.

The figure solutions.




Currently only 1 solution exist /SOMA004 ;Paulo 20100325 /............/............/............/............/.....LL..... /............/............/............/............/.....LZ..... /............/............/............/.....aZ...../.....LZ..... /............/............/.....tT...../.....aZ...../.....aa..... /............/.....tT...../.....tT...../.....TT...../.....BA..... /.....PP...../....vPpV..../...vvpPVV.../..ZZBppAZZ../LZZaBBAABZZL /.....Pp...../....Vppv..../...VVPPvv.../..aaApPbBB../LLLaAAbbBLLL /............/.....Tt...../.....Tt...../.....TT...../.....Ab..... /............/............/.....Tt...../.....BZ...../.....BB..... /............/............/............/.....BZ...../.....LZ..... /............/............/............/............/.....LZ..... /............/............/............/............/.....LL.....

The solutions. "Check them only if you REALLY need it".


Thank you to Paulo for sharing these magnificent figures with the rest of the SOMA world.



Submitted by Paulo Brina <labri37@gmail.com>
Edited by Thorleif Bundgaard <thorleif@fam-bundgaard.dk>

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