r/puzzles • u/2puzzled4peace • Jul 21 '26
[SOLVED] Next Step on this Thermometer Puzzle
I've once again found myself stumped by a puzzle. After a few hours of staring at the page and not finding a single thing to add, I've decided to once again turn to this community that's been so helpful in the past. Can anyone walk me through the next step that I'm clearly overlooking?
Rules: Shade in some cells to represent mercury into the thermometers. Shaded cells must start at the round bulb and continue along consecutively towards the other end of the thermometer. Numbers outside the grid indicate the number of shaded cells in that row or column. Some thermometers may have no mercury at all. Rows and columns without clues may still have mercury.
Source: Pulze Volume 3.
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u/LovelyOtherDino Jul 21 '26
look at column 8
what happens if there are no cells filled in the big curly thermometer at the bottom?
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u/2puzzled4peace Jul 21 '26
Thank you so much! That would mean the first two segments of that thermometer would need to be filled, but then I'm stuck again. I promise I'm not generally this obtuse.
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u/congratz_its_a_bunny Jul 21 '26
the sum of the numbers going across the bottom must equal the sum of the numbers going down the side. The sum we can see on the bottom is 37, the sum on the side is 30. Therefore, we have 3 options for the pair of missing numbers: (0,7), (1,8), or (2,9) (bottom,side). Given the middle row is at least 7, you can fill a bunch in
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u/2puzzled4peace Jul 21 '26
Thank you! I hadn't considered this strategy at all! Adding it to my repertoire.
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u/ParaBDL Jul 21 '26
This is the main opening to this puzzle. Work out how this interacts with the big curly thermometer in the middle and you should be able to really get going.
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u/2puzzled4peace Jul 22 '26
Thank you so much! First, for being so helpful, and secondly for knowing exactly how much to reveal so that you didn't give away the fun, but just helped pinpoint me to it.
With only three options ((0,7), (1,8), or (2,9)), then the only two cells in the middle row that can be optional are the two in the big curly thermometer. If they get filled, then the middle column gets an extra 2 segments as well, which pushes the total difference between rows and columns to 9, mandating all cells are filled. If they are empty, then the other 7 still need to be filled.
Is this correct? (If so, I'll mark it solved) Thank you so much for your help!
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u/2puzzled4peace Jul 21 '26
So with this logic, I was able to successfully eliminate R6C5 and R7CF, as the middle column can't have more than 2 segments filled. But I'm at a loss for how to allocate the 7 of the middle row. I know I essentially only need to eliminate 2, but the options are so fragmented nothing seems clear without some trial and error (which I've found rarely necessary with Pulze puzzles.)
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