Tuesday, August 29, 2017

Tangram Solution Strategy

On a solve recently I forgot to start with the little corners and instead started by solving the big corners to the little corners. No problem. When finished with the big corners one twist still solved the little corners. I like this because it makes for an easy to remember sequence of pieces to solve. Solve them by size starting with the largest!

Step 1 Solve the six big corners 1 or more at a time by twisting edges or using Up Replace Down to get as many of them as possible then The Move to finish up. Use one of the Little Corners and one of the Edge turns with The Move.

Step 2 Solve the two little corners using at most one simple twist of W. (It is now 5/3/2020 and I am not seeing how this can work. If the 6 big corners were solved in step 1 and then you do W, wouldn't that unsolve half the big corners that were solved in step 1?)

Step 3 Solve the three long edges by moving the slice so they are in the correct spots, then if necessary flip two of them. K A K A K flips L and R. You could flip L and A by moving them to R and flipping them there. Or R and A by moving them to L and flipping them there.

Step 4 Permute the three little edges using The Move with two Edges.

Step 5 Orient the three little edges. L R L R L A L A flips K1 and YP.

Step 6 Solve the six centers 1 or more at a time using (J A J' A) x 3 (W L W' L) x 3 which cycles Bottom > Back > Right. The setup move W' R W swaps the centers on the right and back so the cycle is reversed.

I'm still in that stage where I am learning new things every few solves. Today I started doing the 3 cycle of centers. The way I do it is by doing two 5 cycles. The second one puts two of the pieces back and results in a 3 cycle. So if you only need a 3 cycle you have to do the two 5 cycles. But what if you need a 5 cycle? Today that was the situation. I started with the first 5 cycle and before I started the second one noticed that after one 5 cycle all I needed was a 3 cycle. Get it? So in Step 6 if you need a 5 cycle think about this.

(J A J' A) x 3 cycles R>F>L>U>B. Right, Front, Left, Up, Back.