Missing Piece - Stewart Coffin Design #103

I thought I should post about this curious puzzle that I think is overshadowed by Stewart’s ‘Cuckoo Nest’.

This one has one less bar hence the name.  I was heavy into Pen turning at the time and had two ornamental lathes at the time so I dressed the bars up with some fancy fluting!

Here’s what Stewart said about the design:

“The five bars with three holes each of Missing Piece closely resemble those of the six-bar Cuckoo Nest #21, hence the farcical name. The geometry is totally different. In this version, three of the 

dowels are attached to bars to make two elbow pieces and one cross piece. The holes are drilled at an angle of 78 

degrees to the axis of the bars, which angle is critical. I determined the spacing of the holes by trial and error to 

be the minimum possible, or close to it. I made 80 of these in ¾-inch birch for use in the IPP15 exchange.”