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BGonline.org Forums
Meyer Dice Tube (revisited)
Posted By: Chuck Bower
Date: Tuesday, 7 September 2010, at 5:27 p.m.
This weekend during the Open Swiss, Rich Munitz asked me if I'd like to play our match with the Meyer Dice Tube. I believe Rich's is version II (CJC told me that a new version is in the works; in fact she had showed me the prototype for v.III in May at the Chi Open).
I agreed. We used my black&white opaque 1/2 inch (Strommen) precision dice. The match ended way too soon (position was posted here -- 4-cube from Rich when I led 2-1/9). Since we were also using a GTII clock with play-counter ON, I should have noted the total number of plays (but unfortunately didn't). Anyway, I recall three instances of cocked dice ("leaners" in the bottom of the tube) during our match, so somewhere in the 2-3% frequency with small statistics. Some other observations (with help from Rich):
1) Tube never got knocked over -- never came close to happening.
2) No die ever ended up on someone's lap, let alone camouflaged on the carpet while players and kibitzers played prospector.
3) Neither of us ever had an issue with seeing the dice.
4) Dice never got stuck on the baffle pins.
5) When the occasional leaner occurred, the remedy was simple and quick.
Enough of the non-negatives. The big positive (and I consider this a huge advantage) -- a lot of time was saved compared to standard methods. How much? I didn't measure it, but 2-3 seconds per player per turn would be my guess. (When I get one of these I'll try and do a systematic study.)
As far as noise goes, Rich's version is a bit noisier than good (lined) dicecups, but my non-scientific observation. I believe the next version will remedy that as the baffle pins are going to be made out of softer material. It would be really nice if one of these will fit inside my (Taki) board. My dicecups are 2 5/16 in. diameter and they just fit (no rattling, no forcing the set closed). Since the tube body is (advertised) 2 1/4 in. and the lids are a bit larger (2 3/8 in?), it probably won't without damaging the board.
Question for Brett: can you make a model for which BOTH endcaps are removable? The o-ring mounting for the (single) open end of Rich's tube seemed to form a nice seal (i.e. I don't see the endcap coming off inadvertantly) so it seems like doing both this way would work, unless there is some structural integrity provided by the sealed end.
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