[Help Thread] Commutators for wings/edges on bigger cubes

[Snigel]

Is there any good guide for swapping edges/wings on bigger cubes? I assume this is possible with commutators, but I've never been good at those, not even on 3x3. For example, imagine a 5x5 in the current state (the edge facing away on the left is orange/green; everything else is solved):



Normally, I would never end up here. I use Yau, but if I were to solve the edges normally, it would scramble 3x3, which is already solved. How can I solve these edges/wings and only the edges/wings? I've tried looking for guides on commutator for wings, but they seem to assume I'm using 3-style, which I don't know. I don't know the terminology either, and people keep referring to easy cases on 3x3 which I don't know either (although I do know M2/OP).

Background: I don't ask this for speedcubing purposes, really, as I would never end up in this state. Instead, I want to create some basic pixel art using bigger cubes, and this requires me to move around pieces arbitrarily. Centre commutators are easy, but I'm struggling with the edges. I'm aware that pieces can't be moved entirely without restrictions.

 

[bldcuber314]

You could try solving these with r2/m2 from 5BLD. J-perm has a tutorial for r2 in his 4BLD tutorial, and Timothy Goh has a tutorial for m2 in his 5BLD tutorial. Both of these are almost the exact same as M2, so you shouldn't have trouble learning them. Good luck!

Note- these aren't commutators but should still work.

 

[Fred]

In this case with green front, yellow top:
Edges: F U F' E' F U' F' E (or F U F' 3U F U' F' 3U', not sure about the notation)
Wings: U L 2U (just the slice) L' U L 2U' L' U2

A nice video on commutators:

Text and applet guide by Gilles Roux that I learned from:

The Easiest Method for Beginners

 

[abunickabhi]

Is there any good guide for swapping edges/wings on bigger cubes? I assume this is possible with commutators, but I've never been good at those, not even on 3x3. For example, imagine a 5x5 in the current state (the edge facing away on the left is orange/green; everything else is solved):

View attachment 36133

Normally, I would never end up here. I use Yau, but if I were to solve the edges normally, it would scramble 3x3, which is already solved. How can I solve these edges/wings and only the edges/wings? I've tried looking for guides on commutator for wings, but they seem to assume I'm using 3-style, which I don't know. I don't know the terminology either, and people keep referring to easy cases on 3x3 which I don't know either (although I do know M2/OP).

Background: I don't ask this for speedcubing purposes, really, as I would never end up in this state. Instead, I want to create some basic pixel art using bigger cubes, and this requires me to move around pieces arbitrarily. Centre commutators are easy, but I'm struggling with the edges. I'm aware that pieces can't be moved entirely without restrictions.

just use a UFr comm sheet from the BLD database blddb.net

 

[unirox13]

Check out my 6x6 LBL vid. I use a 3-cycle commutator to swap edges and it works for any size puzzle and any of the pieces.

 

[Snigel]

Thank you all for the help, these all look very helpful!

 

[Snigel]

Check out my 6x6 LBL vid. I use a 3-cycle commutator to swap edges and it works for any size puzzle and any of the pieces.

I watched the introduction to your video and I think this more or less exactly answers my question; thank you! I would also like to say that your video is pedagogical andwell-made, so I'll check out some of your other content too. Well done!

The only thing I need to do now is to figure out which pieces to move and where to create the effect I want. In case you're curious, I want to write some Chinese characters on two adjacent faces of a 10x10 I have. The centres are pretty easy because they only have one colour each, so as long as I don't use more of one colour than there are centre pieces of that type, it should be fine.

The edges are trickier, especially the edge between the adjacent faces I want to write on, as I need to make sure these pieces actually exist and in the right numbers. I don't care what the remaining six faces of the cube look like, so this should be possible, just not that simple. It's also harder to do 3-cycles when the goal is to move colours arbitrarily rather than solving the cube To add to the challenge, I really don't want to mess up on the 10x10. It took me two hours to solve the first time and I'd really rather not do it again.