From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Mon Mar 15 17:46:20 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id RAA29418 for ; Mon, 15 Mar 1999 17:46:19 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Message-Id: <006c01be6c55$1fdab740$ca685dcb@uwe> From: "UMroaming" To: "Cube-Lovers" Subject: MULTI COLORED PLASTIC SURFACES Date: Fri, 12 Mar 1999 14:27:24 +0800 der Mouse wrote: >> [...] made me wonder why stickers are being used at all? As far as I >> know, nobody has produced a cube (or variation) where the plastic >> "cubies" are colored appropriately without relying on stickers. > >A while ago, I took the smoothest-acting Cube I have, peeled off all >the stickers, took the thing apart, and painted all the facicles. >Et voila! no more sticker problems! It is not to difficult to make cubes or other puzzles without stickers and to spray paint the surfaces, the price is about the same. I once made a Pyraminx test run using this method. As David Singmaster mentioned the plastic surface under the sticker has some flow lines which are unavoidable and the sticker serves in part to hide these imperfections. >>The one which I bought in India did not have spray-painted >>surfaces, it was made out of multicolored plastic. So I think that >>manufacturers can afford it. The problem with molding the cubes out of colored plastic is the corner pieces. as they have to be molded in 3 different colored plastic, such tooling and molding procedure is extremely expensive and I can not imagine that India has the technology to produce such an item. What would make more sense is to make the stickers out of small clip on plastic tiles such as is used in my Impossiball this would not increase production cost, but totally new tooling would need to be made costing around US$50,000.00. I made a survey for my Pyraminx many years ago. Using either colored plastic tiles or the none slip fluorescent stickers and the stickers won. >Now, I just need to do that with one of the 5-Cubes I have, the one >that's suffering from the Dread Orange Sticker Disease; it's already >lost one orange sticker completely, and about four more are so loose >that only a piece of masking tape is keeping them with the Cube. >(Assuming I can figure out how to get it apart non-destructively.) > >I agree, it would be much more pleasant if the plastic itself were >colored. But that would require at least six different plastics, >instead of one, which is probably why it's not done commercially. >Low volume already makes the things expensive.... No problem to use different colored plastics only the corner pieces pose a problem. >On the other hand, I wonder how much more it really would cost to do >colored plastics. Anyone with enough experience in the industry to >say? As mentioned above there would be no cost increase apart from new tooling having to be made for the corner pieces and the flow marks on some of the surfaces will be noticeable. The best solution would be spray painting, as is being done with my Orbix and the 4 colored rings on my 3D-Puzzle Balls. I hope that this clears up your discussion on why Manufacturers use stickers. Regards Uwe HAPPY PUZZLING Uwe Meffert P.O. Box 24455, Aberdeen, Hong Kong. Tel. 852-2518-3080, Fax. 852-2518-3282 Email:- uwe@ue.net www.ue.edu www.ue.net www.mefferts-puzzles.com