The Rubik's Triamid is a

mechanical puzzle A mechanical puzzle is a puzzle presented as a set of mechanically interlinked pieces in which the solution is to manipulate the whole object or parts of it. While puzzles of this type have been in use by humanity as early as the 3rd century BC ...

invented by Ernő Rubik and released in 1990 by

Matchbox A matchbox is a container or case for matches, made of paperboard, cardboard, thin wood, or metal, generally in the form of a box with a separate drawer sliding inside the cover. Matchboxes generally measure 5 x 3.5 x 1.5 cm, and commonly have ...

. The puzzle was patented in Hungary in 1991. It was re-released in 2017 at the American International Toy Fair by Winning Moves. The puzzle is similar to the Rubik's Cube in that the objective is to manipulate the puzzle until all sides are uniform in colour. The puzzle itself forms a triangular pyramid, so that there are four sides and colours.

Rules

The Triamid is made of ten individual pieces (each with four coloured sides) and four joining sections. The user is able to manipulate the puzzle by removing a small pyramid (of four pieces) from any of the four end points, rotate it, and reattach it. The puzzle is solved when each side of the pyramid has a single colour. The puzzle is superficially similar to the

Pyraminx The Pyraminx () is a regular tetrahedron puzzle in the style of Rubik's Cube. It was made and patented by Uwe Mèffert after the original 3 layered Rubik's Cube by Ernő Rubik, and introduced by Tomy Toys of Japan (then the 3rd largest toy c ...

but, unlike that puzzle, it is possible to move pieces between a side and a corner position.

Pieces

Each piece of the puzzle has four faces. Of the ten pieces: * six pieces have two colours, and * four pieces have three colours (that is, they have only one colour repeated). In the solved state, the four pieces with three colours must lie on the end points of the pyramid.

References

{{Rubik's Cube Combination puzzles Educational toys Hungarian inventions Mechanical puzzles