Stock material or miscellaneous articles – Plural parts with edges or temporary joining means each...
Patent
1998-04-24
2000-03-07
Thomas, Alexander
Stock material or miscellaneous articles
Plural parts with edges or temporary joining means each...
428195, 273157R, B32B 306
Patent
active
06033746&
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
The present invention relates to a jigsaw and more particularly, a jigsaw with interchangeable pieces.
Providing more than one solution to a jigsaw puzzle has been disclosed in the prior art. Australian patent specification number 133511 discloses a jigsaw which is designed so that a panel of the puzzle bearing a representation can be interchanged with an auxilliary panel bearing a different representation so as to produce a variation of the original picture. The problem is solved by having common features along the puzzle interlocking edges of the respective panels and different features within the respective panels. Despite the fact that the panels are interchangeable, each of the pieces within each panel are designed to occupy a fixed position with respect to the other pieces in order to form the representation and individual pieces are not interchangeable.
Dutch patent application number 9100179 discloses two puzzles which are linkable by having matching edge sections. It appears that the puzzles can be linked together by having a common intersecting line. The line has to extend from top to bottom and the edge pieces are not in themselves interchangeable.
UK patent number 424772 overcomes the problem by providing a set of common pieces, such as parts of the anatomy, which can then be interchanged with other pieces presenting that same part of the anatomy in a different manner. Although this game provides some creativity, it does lack versatility and relies upon a pre-determined general solution so that the respective parts of the anatomy are always placed in the same relationship with the other parts even though any particular part has a varied set of pieces.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,052,074 relates to a similar concept but, in this case, relies upon the symmetrical morphology of its objects such as butterflies. The puzzle is limited to representations of forms which have inbuilt morphological dividing lines which form the edges of the pieces. Again, the main drawback is that each piece has a fixed location with respect to the other pieces in the puzzle even though by providing a variety of pieces for each position patterns and colours for each piece can be varied.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a jigsaw puzzle with greater versatility and more creative options.
According to the present invention there is provided a jigsaw comprising at least some pieces which are adapted to be placed alongside a plurality of other pieces by having an upper surface feature extending substantially completely along any one or more of the mating edges thereof so that any other piece with the corresponding upper surface feature extending substantially completely along any one of the corresponding mating edges thereof can be placed alongside the or any one of the corresponding upper surface feature edge(s) of the former piece.
By allowing any particular surface feature to extend, completely along one or more mating edges of the piece it can be matched up with the edge of another piece which similarly has the same surface feature extending completely along it. For instance, the surface feature may represent water such as a lake, ocean, river or sea. The piece may then be laid alongside any other piece which has the same water feature extending along one of the sides thereof. Because there is no break in the feature along the edge it may be mated with any other piece in the jigsaw which has the same feature extending completely along one of its edges.
Preferably, the upper surface feature extends completely along a whole number of mating edges. Thus, in a piece with four edges the upper surface feature may extend along one, two, three or four of the edges of the piece. In this way, if the surface feature extended along two edges, say at right angles, it would not impinge upon the third or fourth edge which would leave these latter edges free to accomodate a different feature which could then be combined with any other piece with such a different feature. Thus the versatility of the game is considerably increased b
REFERENCES:
patent: 4177305 (1979-12-01), Feingold et al.
patent: 5330806 (1994-07-01), Bythewood et al.
Lights, Camera Interaction!, Inc.
Thomas Alexander
LandOfFree
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