Rubix Cube Solution: March 2009

Well, now that you have experienced the challenge of Rubik's cube and lost, you know why we say it's so perplexing. Chin up! In order to help you regain your sanity, we have developed the following simple approach to the ultimate rubix cube solution.

Take heart, with a little practice and some memorisation we will soon have you dazzling your friends, relatives and total strangers with your new found mastery of Rubik's cube.

The solution to Rubik's Cube requires concentration and faithful attention to the detailed instructions in each part. It should take you about an hour to read the direction and solve the cube mechanically. However, if you repeat the process several times, you will begin to understand how and why each group of moves work. You may even develope your own approach to the solution.

We suggest that you memorise the groups of moves so that you learn to solve the cube without the directions. Once you can solve it on your own, the fun really begins as you try to do it faster and faster. Rubik's cube can be solved in 2 minutes flat, so have fun.

To solve the cube, you must understand first all of the component parts of the rubix cube and master a few basic moves.

1. THE CUBE

Basic Cube Parts - Rubik's Cube ia a deceptively innocent looking 2 and a quarter inch cube with over 3 billion possible colour combinations. It has 6 sides, 6 colours, and 26 smaller sub-cubes (see figure A).

There are 8 corner pieces with 3 colours, 12 middle edge pieces with 2 colours and centres with 1 colour each (see figure B). In the ultimate solution, each sub-cube has only one correct location.

2. PERSPECTIVES

First, to make sure we are looking at the cube in the same way we must agree what to call each side:

All turns are either 90 degrees (1 turn) or 180 degrees (2 turns).

3. COLOUR ALIGNMENT

Colour alignment is an important concept to understand, and it is illustrated in figures 3A and 3B. A completed cube (A) has all its pieces colour aligned.

Now imagine popping out one sub-cube, then putting it back in with its 2 colours reversed. This piece would now be in correct position but not colour aligned (see B below)

4. HOW IT WORKS

A. The cube can be manipulated by rotating rows vertically or horizontally, and just a few simple turns are required to produce a completely random pattern of colour.

B.a) The centre square on each side determines the colour of that side (see fig (A) below)

b) No matter how the colours are mixed, if you were to hold your thumb and forefinger on opposite centre pieces, they would show you which colours appear opposite each other on the cube, eg. if left centre is blue then right centre must be green. (see fig (B) below)

Note: This may vary from cube to cube since each cube may be labelled differently.

c) In order to solve a side you must move certain cubes from vertical to horizontal planes, to line up rows of 3 sub-cubes of the same colour. Note: one turn moves a sub-cube 3 places, and 2 turns will move it 6 places

5. THE OBJECTIVE

The objective is to return all 6 sides to their original solid colours, and there is lots of satisfying fun along the way as you solve one or more sides to create interesting new patterns of colour. Here are the levels of skill you can attain.