Gigamic Manufacturing Process

The manufacturing processes used to make wooden pieces requires a great deal of care.
Although it is important to choose the right product (quality of wood, etc.), it is just as important to choose the right process. Take varnishing, for example, an essential stage in achieving a particular appearance and "feel" of a piece.
A very natural waxing process is used to provide the gloss and satin-smooth finish on boxwood pieces such as PYLOS balls. This noble species of wood is ideal to achieve the fine grain required for these small regular spheres.
The same wax finish is used for QUORIDOR chips. Because they are so thin - just 4 mm - polyurethane varnish tumbling cannot be used as the edges could chip and make the pieces stick together.
This type of varnishing, however, gives the pieces an unparalleled gloss which is of capital importance for QUARTO and QUIXO pieces for example. The resulting gloss, combined with the "volume" of the pieces, is what makes them attractive and guarantees their high quality.
The use of different varnishing techniques for each type of piece is regularly controlled by the research and tests carried out with French game makers in the Jura mountains. They are still among the best wood turners and inlayers in the world. Many thanks to them all - and well done!

QUARTO, launched in 1991 by Gigamic, is a strategy game played with sixteen uniquely different pieces.
This is no doubt its major appeal (twelve international awards to date...), but it also increases the complexity of mass production.
The world-renowned wood-turnshop in the French Jura region soon found simple solutions to manufacture the eight round pieces. However, the set of eight square pieces required long hours of specific tooling and special procedure research.
The objective was to give them the same finish and aspect as the round pieces, i.e. no sharp edges, rounded grooves, etc., while achieving quick production to avoid prohibitive costs.
A solution, classified "Top Secret", was finally found. It allows a fairly high output of the square pieces and gives the finished set a consistency that is obviously part of the game's attraction.
Yet this homogeneity is somewhat relative: there are two differences between the large round dark hollow piece and its almost twin, the large square dark hollow piece: their shape... and production time.
The first takes one third of the time to sculpt with the tool's blades. Once they have been given their final shape, the pieces are stained in successive baths, dried ad then varnished for hours in 7 cubic-meter barrels revolving around a slanted axis.
This last phase is essential: it gives the pawns their unparalleled gloss as they tumble around smoothing each other for hours... before they can reach our expert hands for exciting games!

Did you know that the acreage of the beautiful French forest increases every year ? One of its most prestigious attendants is charm. Its noble and vigorous species are particularly suitable for the manufacturing of QUIXO cubes.  These are prepared from 37 x 37 x 1200 mm sticks. One pass through the planning machine turns them into large wooden rulers whose edges are beveled by sharp blades and the four sides are accurately cut to a 30 x 30 mm size. Thanks to the manufacturing of two new purpose-built machine tools, the parts are then cut down to format, all 8 remaining edges being beveled at the same time. They then go through the sanding machine, are dip dyed and subsequently noughts and crosses are branded on them. In order to give them a nice wood finish and to avoid them soaking in products the pieces are dry sanded for hours on a polishing drum before being varnished. The defective items are then finally sorted out. All in all, four full days are required to turn out one cube. This cube will retain constant dimensions like its three million twin brothers that have already been produced...

The game Batik was awarded a Golden Ace in France and a Toy Award in Belgium. Its presentation, with its highly original, attractive board made of a combination of wood and "plastic", is no doubt one of the reasons .
A few technical problems were encountered before constant production quality could be guaranteed.
- Choice of glue : a product had to be found which respects game and toy standards while ensuring good adhesiveness between varnished wood and plastic. The combination of two major names in the field was necessary.
- Mastery of materials : plastic moves as much as wood : it buckles in the heat, bends under tension, etc. After numerous tests, Polymetacrylate was chosen as it meets the required level of transparency and resistance. Since the surface tension is different on either side, the same gluing direction must always be respected in order to prevent the boards from twisting. The grooves in the wooden side pieces have a two degree angle to ensure correct spacing.
Bending of the pieces must also be avoided. Two species of wood are used : either beech taken from the heart of the trunk, which guarantees stability, or Lithocarpus Glaber, which is more pliable, softer and reasonably unbreakable.
Once these adjustments had been made, a very strict procedure was developed in association with the manufacturers, so that Gigamic can now guarantee continuous quality control and respect its own requirements in this field.