[Review] CZ Aluminium Alloys Magic Cube 3x3x3

[Pariah Zero]

This thread is for reviews of the CZ Aluminum Alloys Magic Cube. You can vote in the poll above, but please only vote if you own this particular puzzle.

When posting your review, please follow a template similar to this:

• Where the puzzle was purchased:
• When the puzzle was purchased:
• Thoughts on the puzzle:

 

[Pariah Zero]

Where Purchased: Cubezz.com
When Purchased: May 2014
Thoughts on Puzzle:

I'm not sure if "CZ" is a Cubezz brand, but I figured: Metal puzzle! Sweet!

First Impressions:

The puzzle is very heavy - mine weighed in at about 300 grams - or roughly 2/3 of a pound.

My first thought was There's no way this is Aluminium...

My second thought was... phew! This thing stinks! (Literally). The factory lube is not odorless.

It smells fairly strongly of grease & petroleum. The smell is very similar to White Lithium grease. Given the properties of White Lithium grease, I'm willing to bet that's what it is.

Mechanics:

It took a knife to crack off the center caps, but they are not glued down.

Removing the screw revealed the mechanics of the cube:

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As I suspected, it's the basic Rubik's mechanics.

The edge pieces are open on one end, and the corner pieces have a plastic cap to cover the open end:

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The center pieces and core are both polymer (though the center caps are alloy)

Note the blue-green color: Apparently there was a reaction of some sort with the grease.

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All of the pieces have mold flash that could be smoothed down, if you're patient enough...

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I really didn't care for the smell of the factory lube, and since Silicon lube repels water & inhibits corrosion, I decided to wash the pieces & re-lube it.

After removing the lithium lube, drying, and re-lubing with Silicone grease, it feels great, and doesn't stink anymore.

Stickers:

The stickers are a laminate decal, with a colored base, and a thicker, textured polymer on top. The feel is most like The CubeSmith's polycarbonate tiles, in between the "textured" and "smooth" finish. The decals easily de-laminate.

Turning

The cube turns smoothly, and I could easily finger-trick between 2U and 3U. There's a lot of momentum to keep the turn moving. Since it's so heavy, it takes a more force to get the cube to turn.

Tensions

The screws have one depth - they bottom out and leave about 1.5mm of gap between the center piece and the core, which is about perfect. it also makes the cube easy to tension - just tighten the screws until they snug up.

Corner Cutting

The cube can forward cut about 1/2 of a cubie.

It doesn't reverse corner cut, and can easily sprain your fingers if you try. (Hint: Metal...)

I haven't been able to pop a piece; the only way to get it apart is via removing a center cap & screwdriver.

That leaves me with the final question: What is the thing made of?

Warning: Science content!

While I was washing the cube's factory lube off, I decided to use the trick of displacing water to get the volume, and weigh the pieces, and compute the density of the alloy to get an idea of what the metal really is.

I measured out 400 mL of water, and dropped pieces in (removing air bubbles) until the water level rose by 25 mL.

Next I weighed that 25 cm^3 of pieces: 189.5 g.

That makes the density of the alloy about 7.58 g/cm^3.

Enter Wikipedia:

Density of Aluminium: 2.70 g/cm^3.
Density of Iron: 7.874 g/cm^3.
Densit of Zinc: 7.14 g/cm^3

• If the alloy were Aluminum, it should weigh less than half of its actual weight.
• The measured density is a close match for the density of Iron or Zinc
• Other metals are too expensive to consider.

Other notes:

• The alloy is not magnetic
• There are many non-magnetic steel alloys.

I'm going to make a guess that this thing is made out of a stainless steel or iron/zinc alloy. There might be some Aluminum in it, but there isn't much.

 

[mark49152]

Great review, thanks! Looks interesting as a novelty cube. Can you post pics of the stickers?