Pluredro Newsletter

Pluredro shop has started distribution of the newsletter!
We will send the newsletter when we start selling new puzzles, hold puzzle auctions on eBay or any other very important notices. Probably, the frequency of the distribution of newsletter will be once or twice a month.

If you would like to receive the Pluredro newsletter, please enter your email address under the left side of the top page of our online shop and press the "Subscribe" button. (See the red circle on the picture below)

Then you will receive a confirmation email from us.
Click the link of "Authenticate now" and all the procedure is done.

We are currently making two new different puzzles.
Please look forward to them!

eBay Auction, shipping notice, new SD puzzle

It has been a long time since I last updated this blog. I hope you and your family are doing well during this difficult time.

We have received emails from puzzle lovers asking whether we have been doing well. Thank you very much for caring about us, we are pretty fine.

If you are registered to our newsletter, you may already know that we have started an eBay auction of Coin Case. If you have not yet registered to our newsletter, please follow the link below and complete the subscription.

Pluredro Newsletter
https://blog.pluredro.com/2017/11/pluredro-newsletter.html

About the eBay auction
We have put three of the 2nd grade Coin Cases up on eBay auction. Coin Case is the simplest puzzle box Juno has ever designed and the number of steps is small. If you are used to playing with puzzles, you can solve it within a minute. However, if you cannot find out the trick, it can take a lot longer to solve. There is one thing that I want to remind you of, Coin Case is NOT a sequential discovery puzzle. There are no tools contained to solve it.

The retail price of Coin Case is AUD $88.00. After finishing the auction, we are starting to sell product versions of Coin Case on Sunday 19th July 07:00 Brisbane time.

Parcel service impacts due to COVID-19
We have found a new notice at Australia Post updated on 2nd July. It says that we cannot ship parcels to some specific countries from Australia due to COVID-19 effect.

https://auspost.com.au/about-us/news-media/important-updates/coronavirus/coronavirus-international-updates

Please note that if we received an order from countries where we cannot dispatch a parcel now, we will keep the order until we are able to send it out. In that case, and then, we will notify you by email. Please do not hesitate to place an order as usual if you would like to purchase our puzzle products.

New SD puzzle
We are sometimes asked when we are going to release a new sequential discovery puzzle. I can only say that it will take a long time to be completed because the puzzle consists of lots of small parts and intensive, time consuming CNC machining is required. Juno does not want to say much about uncompleted projects so, please be patient and wait for the updates notified by the newsletter.

The new SD puzzle does really have lots of tricks and steps. Some of the steps are very uncommon and unusual. It is going to be the puzzle that has the most number of tools used among our sequential discovery puzzles, full of fun and amazement.

Yukari

The 5th Auction Results

We held an eBay auction and it ended on 18th May.
This time, we had put 2 puzzles that had subtle imperfections.
The sales results are as follows:

Quarted Box:  AUD355.00

Alcyone:           AUD44.44

The total amount was AUD399.44. As we had promised, we donated half of the sales (AUD200.00 )to AWLQ (Animal Welfare League Queensland) to support dogs and cats today. Here is the receipt of the donation.

We thought that there are cats in the facility of the AWLQ Beenleigh Rehoming Centre, but there are no cats. It's nice that there are not many cats that are waiting for a foster family, but other AWLQ facilities have lots of cats, dogs, birds and farm animals. We hope our donation will be helpful for them.
These are pictures of fluffy friends that welcomed us today.

We are going to hold the same type of auction when we get puzzles with subtle flaws. I think this is a good chance to get a puzzle at a low price.

Every time we start an auction, we will send a newsletter. If you are interested in auctions or our new puzzle information, please join the Pluredro newsletter!

The details of registration is on the following page.

Pluredro Newsletter

http://blog.pluredro.com/2017/11/pluredro-newsletter.html

Temporary Shop Closure

Hi puzzle lovers, how have you been?
Juno and I are good as always.

Probably, some people may have already noticed that we are temporarily closing our online shop and our eBay shop. It's just a temporary closing due to the diminution of international/domestic flights. For example, Qantas has decided to cut 90% of international flights. We still can ship parcels, but it might cause some issues like a delay or a missing parcel which we want to avoid. Therefore, we have decided to close our shop for a while. We will open our shop as soon as possible when the logistics return to normal.

Having said that, we are at home and are making puzzles as usual (a bit slower pace though), so, please feel free to contact us if you have any inquiry.

We have been making three kinds of puzzles, a small puzzle box, a burr puzzle and a big sequential discovery puzzle. While this situation is going on, we are making puzzles at home and preparing for the day of selling puzzles. When there is news from us, we will notify you sending our newsletter or write about it on this blog and our website. If you have not yet registered to our newsletter, please join it.

We hope you all have healthy days and keep yourselves safe.

Pluredro Newsletter: https://blog.pluredro.com/2017/11/pluredro-newsletter.html

The first puzzle in 2019: Chubby Crocodile

The first puzzle in 2019 is a unique look that we have never made. It's a crocodile! This is the first animal shaped puzzle for us.

As you see, it's chubby. There is a small cavity inside of its body. We have put one or two "something" inside and you will find it when you solve it.

The puzzle is not very difficult like other Juno's design puzzles, yet I'm sure it puzzles you. Why do I know it will puzzle you?
That's because I, myself, was puzzled by it even though I knew the inside structures.

The Chubby Crocodile has wavy lines. The straight edges are easy to sand, but wavy lines need manual work. Juno and I worked very hard to polish the puzzle both the flat surface and the edges. It's a bit hard to see by the pictures, but its skin is smooth and shiny unlike a real crocodile.

We are going to hold an eBay auction and will sell one Chubby Crocodile which is second grade and one of Juno's prototype puzzle someday soon.

When we start the auction, we will let you know by newsletter as usual. If you are not yet registered for our newsletter, please see the following page for registration.

http://blog.pluredro.com/search?q=newsletter

We hope you will have a fun time with the puzzle of one of the animals representing Australia.

Yukari

Puzzle auction and coming new puzzles

We have put three puzzles up for auction on eBay! Every puzzle starts from $1.00 AUD! As we have always done, we are going to donate half of the sales of this auction to the Animal Welfare League Queensland (AWLQ).

Please note that the puzzles we have put up for the auctions are all test version. Compared with the products we are selling at our shop, the material, durability, finishing and precision look to be at a disadvantage. When you bid, please make sure of the quality by looking at the picture on eBay.

Juno usually makes prototype or test version puzzles when or before we produce our regular products.
The test version of Grooved 6 Board Burr #2 was kept after we released its regular products because we didn't have many puzzles up for auction.
Its only but big difference to the regular one is the material. The test version is made of PNG Rosewood and is not durable compared to our original plywood that is used for the regular ones.

Juno has also made two test versions of Grooved 6 Board Burr #3 using solid timber of PNG Rosewood and Jarrah. Unlike our regular products, several grooves on the puzzle pieces were milled out manually by a small milling machine.

Well, as mentioned above, we have a new design of our Grooved 6 Board Burr series and its production is almost completed. The regular version of Grooved 6 Board Burr #3 is made of our original plywood of New Guinea Walnut and European Beech. Our new CNC router was used to produce the puzzle and the machine did very intensive work.

We are planning to release Grooved 6 Board Burr #3 and a sequential discovery puzzle box Slammed Car around mid-June.

The latter puzzle requires lots of steps, around 15 to 20 depending on how it is counted to access the internal cavity. Several hours of CNC work was necessary for each puzzle and it took a long time to produce the puzzle even though we have two CNC routers, and both were occasionally used at the same time.

We will notify our newsletter subscribers by email when the two new puzzles are available.

If you have not registered to our newsletter, please take a look at the following blog entry.

Pluredro Newsletter

Yukari

19th Auction Results and coming new puzzles

We held an eBay auction and it ended on 13th March.
This time, we had put 2 kinds, a total of puzzles of 5 puzzles.

6BB Oddly Extended Version #01 (2nd grade) x3
6BB Oddly Extended Version #01 (Pine test version) x1
Floating Framed Burr (2nd grade) x1
Total sold amount: AUD $322.24
Donated amount: AUD $165.00

The total sales amount was AUD $322.24 and as we promised, we donated about half of the total sales amount AUD $165.00 to BirdLife Australia on Sunday.
Here is the receipt (right bottom).

The product version of 6BB OEV #01 was sold out in a day which means there are no stock of our original plywood puzzles. Well, don't worry. Juno thought something like this might happen, he has made lots of original plywood. He has already started making the next burr puzzles.

If you are a sequential discovery puzzle lover, probably you would like to know when you will be able to get the next one. We are still working on it and cannot tell when they will be available. We will send our newsletter as soon as they are ready for sale. If you haven't registered for our newsletter, please join!

Yukari

3 New Puzzles on Sale!

We have started selling our three new puzzles!

One of the three is a trick opening puzzle box and we named it Quartet Box. You will be able to know why we named it "Quartet" if you play with it.
The other two puzzles are 6-piece interlocking burr puzzles, but they are non-orthogonal. The shape of these two look like a shining star, so we took names from the stars in the Pleiades star clusters, Alcyon and Merope.
Please take a look at each puzzle's details on our online shop pages.

While making three puzzles, some puzzles that we hesitate to sell as products remain.
The four gears of the production version of Quartet Box is made with eight kinds of timber, but there is one left that cannot be completed with eight colours.
There is also a second grade Alcyon which has obvious chipout on the pieces. Both of them can be played with no problem.

After a while, we are going to put them on eBay auction. As we have always done, we are going to donate half of the sales of this auction to the Animal Welfare League Queensland (AWLQ). According to AWLQ, they maintained zero euthanasia by donation last year. We hope our little donation will be a help for them.

We will let you know about the auction on this blog and by our newsletter. If you have not registered for our newsletter, please take a look at the bottom left of our shop website.

Looking Back to 2021

Hello puzzle lovers!

There is only less than a month left this year.
We are working on new puzzles, but they are hard to be completed this year, so our next puzzles will be released in 2022. We will notify you when they are ready by sending a newsletter.

So, as usual, let's look back on what we released in 2021.
In total, we have produced 10 puzzles this year.

In March, we released these three puzzles. Most of our puzzles are difficult to solve, but I think Bumpy Pentominoes is the one that can be played easily and enjoyed by everyone for a challenge.

6BB Oddly Extended Version #01
Floating Framed Burr
Bumpy Pentominoes

In May, we released these two puzzles.

6 Board Burr 5x8 #02
Beauy Kruse

In July, we released a sequential discovery puzzle. This puzzle looks like an ordinary cube, but it contains some tools and some mechanism that trick you.

Sequential Discovery Cubed Box

In October, we released these four puzzles. Grooved 6 Board Burrs are a type of puzzle that Juno has been working on and this time, it finally reached No.5 and No.6. I am not sure whether he is going to make No.7. Probably, he is.

Grooved 6 Board Burr #5
Grooved 6 Board Burr #6
Bubinburr
Plumply 12

We will make enjoyable puzzles that can make puzzle lovers happy next year too.

Wishing you a wonderful holiday season from Juno and Yukari.

22nd Auction Results, new puzzles etc.

We held an eBay auction, and it successfully ended on 19th February. This time, we had put 2 kinds of puzzles in total 5 puzzles. The sales results are as follows:

The total sales amount was AUD $407.69, so we rounded it up and donated AUD $204.00 to Save The Bilby Fund.
Here is the receipt.

We have started selling our new puzzles, Splitted 12, and Puzzle Turbine on Saturday. Both puzzles are of a very high level, requiring many moves to remove the first piece from the assembled figure. Splitted 12 has unique level 17-22 solution and Puzzle Turbine has unique level 38 solution.

Recently I have heard the sad news that Koalas are listed as an endangered species on the Australian east coast. I wanted to help them and sowed several Eucalyptus seeds last month. Unfortunately, it seemed like I did something wrong, only one could germinate. This is a Eucalyptus tereticornis, commonly known as Blue Gum, one of Koala's favorite trees. Yes, the same as us, Koalas have their favorite tastes.

We know there is a type of puzzle that is the favorite of most puzzle lovers. We are producing new sequential discovery puzzles with great care now. It will still take some time to complete. So, please wait until we release our newsletter.

Yukari

Three new burr puzzles

We have started selling following three new puzzles, Stretchy 12, Staggered 12 and Juno's L7 Notchable.

Juno wanted to use one of our special plywood that can be used for 3 x 1 profile pieces. So, he designed Staggered 12 first and soon realized that he didn't have to use the plywood for the 3 x 1 profile pieces because their shape was not so complicated. If the pieces had enough thickness and they were made by hard and durable timber, the pieces won't break.

He has chosen Burmese Teak for Staggered 12 and started designing another puzzle that was good to be made by the plywood. Stretchy 12 became the candidate but Juno hesitated to use the design once because the puzzle must be way too difficult to solve even to very talented solvers. What changed his mind was the fun of the moves and transformation of the puzzle. Checking the solution on Burr Tools, he thought that it was going to be an attractive and gorgeous looking puzzle if three kinds of timber were used.

After he had finished making Staggered 12, there were several meters of Bubinga stocks. Juno made up his mind to use up those remaining timber and designed a rather simpler puzzle. It became Juno's L7 Notchable, a six piece burr that requires seven moves to remove the first piece apart from the assembled shape. As you can see in the image below, there are pins and holes on the pieces. This is how Juno cheated to make the puzzle a bit more complex compared to a normal notchable six piece burr.

We have been working on a sequential discovery puzzle now. It seems that we have to do lots of work to complete the puzzle. We can't say at this moment when the next puzzle will be released. We will release a newsletter when the puzzle becomes available.

Hope you enjoy our latest burr puzzle products.

Yukari

Tortoise Protocol, 34th Auction Results

We will release our new sequential discovery puzzle, Tortoise Protocol, in one week. If you have already received our newsletter, you’ve probably had a chance to see what the puzzle looks like.

Since we can only produce a limited number, it may not reach everyone who wants one. However, we sincerely hope it will find its way into the hands of those who truly wanted it.

Our 34th auction received many bids. All four Tortoise Protocol puzzles listed as second grade sold for more than twice the regular product price. Combined with the four burr puzzles auctioned at the same time, the total winning bids amounted to AUD $12,330.

As always, half of the proceeds were donated to charity. This time, as with the same period last year, the donation was made to Backpack Bed for Homeless Australia. It is currently winter in the Southern Hemisphere, and this year has been colder than usual. We hope the donation will help those facing harsh conditions. We also want to thank the bidders who understood the purpose of our auction and generously placed their bids.

Happy Puzzling!

Slammed Car won the Jury Grand Prize

It was good news to hear that one of our puzzle products, Slammed Car, won the Jury Grand Prize at the 2019 Nob Yoshigahara Puzzle Design Competition. We received lots of congratulatory messages and we thank all of you who supported us.

Although we run a niche business producing wooden mechanical puzzles, the name of the designer is not Juniche but Junichi. When Juno was a small kid, he complained to his mother asking why his Japanese name looked simpler compared to two of his elder brothers. His mother told Juno that all the Japanese names of her three sons have the same number of spelling strokes and your name means No. 1 hoping to be No. 1. Juno's mind was not so twisted as today at the time and he was convinced and thought that "OK, I have to be No. 1." Anyways, Juno likes to be spelled as Juniche and he captured the image of the competition website before the committee fixed the mistyping.

We have produced nearly 100 Slammed Cars and thanks to your support, the cars are almost gone.

Now, it is a good opportunity to inform our customers who have already bought the car. We expected that some of the small parts of the puzzle can be lost or damaged, so we produced extra parts. We heard the car displayed at the competition was also damaged and we think positively it meant many people played with the puzzle. There are especially decent numbers of spare parts of wing mirror sets and the spanner. One of our customers told us the front rego plate was chewed by his dog.

You know, the world is complex, and we don't know what will happen; chewed by a dog, traffic accident and so on. Please contact us if you need these spare parts. We can send replacement parts (if available) by non-trackable letter or if you buy another puzzle at Pluredro Shop, we can enclose the replacement part in the package.

We have already been working on our next sequential discovery puzzle product, but it is impossible to tell at the moment when the puzzle will be available. Please understand that we also can't reserve our puzzle products because if everybody starts asking us for a reservation, we just cannot handle it, and it is also important for fairness to let the early birds catch the worm. The first announcement of our new products is always notified by Pluredro Newsletter and if you are not subscribed, please register.

Yukari

Gentle Interlock burr puzzle

We have released our new burr puzzle, Gentle Interlock. The name was chosen because it is relatively approachable even for beginners who are not yet familiar with burr puzzles.

When we manufacture a puzzle, we are usually left with offcuts of timber in various sizes. While the leftover pieces from making just one type of puzzle may be minimal, continuously producing many different puzzles leads to a significant accumulation of leftover timber, which begins to take up valuable workshop space. From time to time, Juno looks at these offcuts and wonders if there might be a puzzle he could design using them. Gentle Interlock was born from that very motivation, and it successfully made use of a large portion of the accumulated American Rock Maple stock.

Alongside the production of this puzzle, we have also been continuing work on an SD puzzle. It has been nearly two years since our last SD puzzle release, so thank you for your patience. We expect to be able to announce the release of a new SD puzzle in the not-too-distant future. If you subscribe to our newsletter at the bottom of the page, you'll be among the first to receive updates on upcoming releases.

Happy puzzling!

Dark Matter Burr and 32nd Puzzle Auction Results

We have released our third puzzle of the year, the Dark Matter Burr. This puzzle was inspired by a visit to a timber yard where we were introduced to black wood. It is crafted from our original plywood, combining Koto, resulting in a visually striking product.

The total amount raised in our 32nd auction has set a new record. We would like to express our gratitude to everyone who participated and contributed to the excitement. The total winning bids for the seven puzzles amounted to AUD $16,231.01, of which approximately half, AUD $8,120, was donated to a homeless support organization. Australia, located in the Southern Hemisphere, is entering a period of increasingly harsh winter weather. We hope that our contribution will help those without stable housing to live more comfortably during this challenging time.

This year, we have fewer puzzle releases, but we are currently working on several new projects simultaneously. We will notify you through our newsletter as the release date for the next puzzle approaches, so please stay tuned and be patient.

Our new toy

Most of our customers will know that we have been using a Chinese CNC router for our puzzle production. The machine is very reliable, does accurate work, and is a mandatory tool in our workshop. Many of our products could not have been made without the CNC router in a realistic working time frame.

Despite that, we had an inconvenience because the machine had a relatively smaller work area of 400 mm x 300 mm. In many cases, while we were producing a particular part, we didn't have enough area to cut the other parts in the remaining space of the working table.

Here we go, let's buy another larger machine!
We made up our mind last October and the new larger machine was delivered to our house at the end of last year. Although Juno had made sure that the machine was intact and it could be operated from one of his laptops on the day of delivery, there were many things that had to be done before the machine was used for puzzle production.

A CNC router requires a dedicated computer and it has to be set close to the CNC machine itself. The problem is the place sometimes becomes full of sawdust especially when Juno does rip saw cuts using a table saw. So, he decided to hide the dedicated computer in the cabinet of the CNC router, and then hooked up a computer monitor and a keyboard that comes with a pointing device. When these are not in use, the keyboard is folded down and is wrapped up with the special cover that I made.

The dust boot had to be made because Juno didn't like the size and the functions of commercially sold dust boots. Plumbing work for the duct collection was also necessary.

As you can see on the upper image, we have been producing cars although all the car manufacturing industries in Australia were closed down in 2017. The car is going to be one of our next puzzle products. Juno also has an idea of Grooved 6 Board Burr #3 and the puzzle is already in the production process. We sometimes have been using two of the CNC machines at the same time, worrying about the next electricity bill. Even with these efficient machines, the production takes time, so please wait patiently until we introduce the availability of the puzzles by our Pluredro newsletter.

Yukari