Little things can be deceiving, and Timonen Burr is a good proof of that. This 5cm length burr puzzle will have you screaming obscenities at it in no time, as you try to remove the very first piece. The puzzle is named after its Finish designer, Vesa Timonen, who created it in 2007.

Timonen Burr is made from Sloyd's trade mark birch wood, present in all their puzzles, which gives it this beautiful light tone. The design is also a bit different from the classic burrs with six squares intercepting each other in the middle.

The puzzle is comprised of six pieces with two distinct groups: the first group of three pieces is somewhat similar to the type of pieces you're used to see in the traditional burr (two C's and one G). The second group of pieces, however, is what makes Timonen Burr so unique: three pieces and all different from each other (although one of them is a variation).

When it comes to the difficulty level, Timonen Burr is everything you'd expect from an extremely  challenging burr. Sloyd's own rating system, from 1 to 5, classifies it as a level 5 and I completely agree. It took me about 45 minutes to completely disassemble it, and 15 of them were just to remove the first piece. After that, it was a series of seemingly endless sequential movements that always led me to the same starting point. I was eventually able to remove the second and third pieces, almost at the same time, and the remaining larger three pieces followed right after with very little effort.

If the challenge of disassembling the puzzle wasn't enough, you're supposed to put it back together to fully solve it. Just like my love/hate towards string puzzles, the burrs seem to fall in the same category - A pain to take apart and an even bigger pain to put it back.

If you ever tried to solve a burr puzzle, then you know you have to follow a strict sequence of moves: backwards from the ones you did to take it apart. Well, this wouldn't be a problem if I could remember exactly which moves I did to disassemble it, which I don't... After the initial trial and error to see which piece would fit, I saw that I wasn't going anywhere without instructions. It still took me about 20 minutes to put the puzzle back to its original form, so you can see that even when you're following instructions, it can still be quite tricky.

Closing Comments:

Timonen Burr is a "little" devil to solve, but I enjoyed particularly taking it apart. Maneuvering the small pieces might take a while to get used to, but other than that it's a highly recommended puzzle for burr lovers.

Availability: You can get a Timonen Burr at Sloyd's for about €19. For other exclusive Sloyd puzzles check out their wide selection.

Links:

Vesa Timonen's Shapeways Shop