Following up on my V Perm post, I thought I’d give another go at doing a multi-cam of a couple other long PLLs — the two Rs:
Over the past month or so, I’ve been trying to eliminate U2’ from most algorithms that call for a double-U turn. When I first began cubing, I realized the exact equivalence between a U2 and a U2’ in terms of the position of the cubies. What I didn’t realize was that U2’, in most cases, is more awkward than U2 and often leaves hand/finger positions incompatible with more efficient finger tricks. Also, now that I do double-U flicks with my right hand (while struggling to do double U’ flicks with my left), it’s just a lot slower to do U2’.
This video (and the chart below it) shows that I’ve replaced U2’ in most algorithms, but have purposely left it as U2’ in a couple others:
This is the third installment in the tough/hard/weird/non-intuitive F2L series, with the first and second posts among the most popular on this site and my Youtube channel. These cases (#15-18) require splitting top-layer pairs before re-combining them — what the F2L wiki refers to as “splitting pairs by going over.” As with the cases in the other tutorials, having now spent some time with alternate algorithms, these seem less “tough” than just non-intuitive.
Following the format of the previous installments, here’s a video tutorial, followed by table contrasting my old (intuitive) approaches against the improved ones:
It’s not weird to have a favorite algorithm, right? I mean, look at unboxing or review videos, and each cuber seems to have a go-to move. For a while now, mine’s been the V Perm — the PLL that (a) swaps opposite corners and (b) swaps the adjacent edges next to them. I hated the V Perm, as I first learned it: R’ U R’ d’ R’ F’ R2 U’ R’ U R’ F R F. That algorithm was clunky, without a good flow.
Enter jskyler91, who posted this “non-standard” V Perm execution, which flows smoothly with no re-grips:
z D’ R2′ D (R2 U R’) D’ (R U’) (R U R’) D (R U’) z’
Since it’s one of the more complicated executions in my repertoire, I thought it would lend itself to a multi-angle video. I did something similar, when I was still learning the algorithm, and I wanted to update it:
Well, the “Hacked” LED-Backlit Cube Give-Away has come to a close. Dozens of new blog subscribers and loads of great youtube comments later, it’s now time to announce the winner.
To pick a winner, I first did a virtual coin flip on random.org to determine whether the winner would be a blog subscriber or youtube commenter. Yes, the 50/50 chance gave disproprotionate weighting to the blog subscribers, which are fewer in number than the comments on the video — a thumb on the scale, if you will. No matter, tails meant a youtube commenter. To pick which commenter, I used a Youtube Random Comment Picker tool.
CONGRATS SKCUBER! I’m a new fan of your channel, and encourage others to check it out. It’s got solves, unboxings, creative projects, and good production.
Thanks to everyone who participated. And remember what I wrote in the opening post: If you have any ideas on how to improve the re-wire job or have the skills to partner up on something more ambitious related to it, let me know....
adventures in cubing 