Loafer/Snippet

Loafer is a c/7 orthogonal spaceship found by Josh Ball on February 17, 2013. Its name refers to its slow speed and loaf-pushing behaviour.

It is the fifth smallest known spaceship in terms of cell count (after glider, lightweight spaceship, middleweight spaceship and heavyweight spaceship), being tied with some nontrivial flotillae. Loafer ranked second place in the Pattern of the Year 2013 competition in a belated vote held on the ConwayLife.com forums, behind the Snark.

Despite the loafer's remarkably small size, it did not occur naturally until April 1, 2020, making it the first spaceship of a non-standard speed to occur in an asymmetric soup. A second soup was found by Rob Liston on June 2, 2020, and a few more have been found since then.

Adam P. Goucher found an 18-glider synthesis for this spaceship on the day of its discovery which Matthias Merzenich reduced to 8 gliders the following day. Two loafer guns were built by Shannon Omick on February 19th, 2013, using these syntheses.