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Baffle Ball
May 2003 Update: After featuring Baffle Ball as my Puzzle of the Month, I subsequently got an enquiry about obtaining one. I told my correspondent that they were very hard to come by, but at Easter 2003 I managed to obtain one for him. I’m always happy to look out for a particular wanted puzzle. These are like gold dust. I don’t have any spares. They occasionally come up on eBay, but expect to pay £50. Mine isn’t for sale. In about 2004 a new puzzle appeared, Superplexus (see picture at foot of page). This was a sort of updated Baffle ball for the 21st century, featuring clever moving parts that formed an aerial walkway along which the puzzler must guide the ball. Using batteries to generate buzzers, a crazy tune and flashing lights, it will appeal to all Baffle Ballers. Ironically it went out of production after just a short time, but they are currently (September 2006) readily available on eBay.
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I haven’t presented a dexterity puzzle here as a Puzzle of the Month before, and so I have chosen one of, if not the most, moronic members of the genre here. This is a transparent plastic bill, six or seven inches in diameter. It has a patent date of 1969 on its surface. Randomly around the inside surface of the ball there are eight small cups, about an inch in diameter, and the same high. They resemble small buckets. One of the buckets has an opening in the side. There is also a small ball inside, about half an inch in diameter. The ball rolls freely inside, quite noisily, and very noisily if it doesn’t roll smoothly. It gets EVEN NOISIER if it hits one of the buckets, sounding almost metallic. All in all, this is one of the most irritatingly antisocial puzzles I have ever seen.
The object of the puzzle, is to move the ball between the cups. Start by turning the ball so that the marble can roll in the side of the cup with a hole in the side. This cup has a number one on its base. The remaining cups are numbered two through eight. The ball must now be turned so that when it is given a sharp but specific twist, the marble falls out of the start bucket into the one marked two. The marble must then progress via all the cups until number 8 is reached. The angles between successive cups varies. Sometimes the next bucket is at about 90 degrees away, sometimes almost diametrically opposite. The noise it makes is quite phenomenal. There is the metallic tinkle of the ball hitting a bucket, then the wobble as it goes in and the satanic clatter when it just hits the rim of a bucket, and bounces outside. Then start again. Where are the men in the nice white coats…?
Above: Supeplexus
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