Riddle Puzzle Box

It is that time of the year again to make a cool gift. (Sinterklaas, surprise)

The gift he wanted is a survival knife. But is girlfriend has, kind of, a reputation of cutting herself with knifes while cooking. So I decided to give the knife in a safe box to keep it out of harms way.

The box is fully lasercut and has a different 6-digit code on all four sides. Only after you solved all the four riddles you can open the box and acces the knife. The riddles are printed on the top of the box.

Tools:

• Acces to a lasercutter
• (Old) paint brush
• Wood glue
• Rubber bands

Materials:

• 3,6 mm plywood 60 x 40 cm

To make your own box, you probably want to make your own riddles.

Specially because the solution of one of the riddles is the name of the guy I'm giving this box and an other is referring to the content. (my riddles are also in Dutch :) )

To inspire you I will give you my riddles:

Riddle one:

Sliders: 0 and 1 so the answer is in binary.

Hint: The answer is the answer.

Answer: 101010 (the binary code for 42 -hitchhikers guide to the galaxy-)

Riddle two:

Sliders: . and - so the answer is in Morse code

Hint: You must be a real one for the content.

Answer: -- .- -. (MAN in morse code. There are only so many things you can do with only 6 digits in morse)

Riddle tree:

Sliders: two Letters on every slider

Hint: Login for safety.

Answer: name (The name of the guy who gets this. You can also spell the name of his girlfriend, but that won't open the box)

Riddle four:

Sliders: -> and <- arrows in different directions

Hint: This one seems logic to me.

Answer: Logic order (The arrows must be put in a logic, clock-wise order)

I added a PDF of the cutting file. The red lines are cutting lines and black is engraving. The file is editable in Adobe Illustrator.

The file is made to cut out of one sheet of 40 x 60 cm plywood on a Trotec Speedy 300 lasercutter, but would probably work as well on any other lasercutter that will take this size of material.

From the 24 rectangular holes out of the big pieces, you will get 24 bigger and 24 smaller rectangles. You will need only the bigger ones.

>>> the design is for 3,6 mm ply <<<

The knobs are really easy to glue in place. They will fit exactly in the indents made by the laser engraving.

• Put a little wood glue on the indent.
• Push the knob in place until you feel that they sink in the indentation.
• Put some weight on them while drying.

When the knobs are dry, you can glue the inner compartment of the box together.

• Hold the four walls together with the knobs on the outside and glue them in the holes in the endplate (without the text on it)
• With the glue still wet, you can push the four walls apart to put glue in between and glue the walls together.
• It can help to hold the walls together with a rubber band while the glue is drying.
• Remove the excess glue with an old brush with warm water.

This part was much easier than I expected. I already lasered lines on the small parts where to glue the bigger part.

• Put glue on the two small parts. (as much within the lines as you can)
• Push the bigger part on the smaller part within the lines.
• Use a brush to remove the excess glue.
• And repeat 24 times.
• Put something heavy on it while drying.

Before you place the sliders you need to think if the slider has to go up or down to open the box.

If you want the slider to go up to open than you should put the U-shape part on the slider on top.

• Sort the six sliders you are doing according to your code.
• Put them in the holes in side board.
• Check one more time if they are all the right way up.
• Put the first slider you are glueing in the middle of the hole.
• Put a little glue in the middle of the slider. (not to much)
• Glue the tile on top, using the small line that is printed on the side board.
• Do this for all six tiles.
• Repeat for all four sides.
• Put something heavy on it when it is drying.

You can see on the back that if you put the sliders in the right code there is a kind of channel for the knob to go through.

Use the inner box to glue the outer shell around. (don't glue the shell to the box!)

• Glue the four sides together.
• Glue the top with the text on top.
• Use rubber bands to hold the shell together while it is drying.

If you put all the sliders in the solved position you should be able to slide the shell from the box. When only one slider is in the wrong position or in the middle the shell and box won't separate.

Here you can see all the finished sides!

The only thing that is left to do is (after you played with it) to put in the gift and giftwrap it to give it away.

Have fun!