Solid Triaxial Ellipsoid in 2021

[Anonymous]

Is there a way to generate a SOLID triaxial ellipsoid that can be scaled, and have Union and Subtraction performed on it?  I have tried blocking out a solid sphere, inserting it after scaling the three axes, and I keep ending up with an object that cannot be manipulated.

[leeminardi · Accepted solution]

To create a solid triaxial ellipsoid you can start with a box with the overall dimensions of the ellipsoid and create an ellipse on each of the 3 principal sides.

Center the ellipses within the box and cut two of them in half (indicated below by different colors, magenta/red for one of the split ellipses, yellow/green for the other).

Give the LOFT command and select the green, then magenta, the yellow, the red ellipses and hit [Enter] then enter G (guides) and select the full cyan ellipse. This will yield a surface object.

Finish by giving the surfsculpt command and select the model to convert it to a solid.

Note, you may need to change the visualstyle to shaded to see the solid shape.

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[Anonymous]

Thank you very much!  This was just what I needed to prepare some geodetic models.

[leeminardi]

You are welcome. I can see using an ellipsoid in a geodesic model but not sure how in a geodetic model. 

[Anonymous]

Briefly, geodesy is the entire science of the size and shape of the earth, and the relationship of points on it, as well as the gravity field. A geodesic is typically a line on an ellipsoid. Thanks again, Bryan

[loulouv18]

Hi, I'm also trying to create a tri-axial ellipsoid but in Inventor. My issue is that I don't know how to make the ellipses arc coincident when they are supposed to cross each other.  Trying your suggested method also didn't work for me because once I have the 3D box (created in 3D sketch) I am not sure how to make the ellipses on the same sides of the box. Would anyone be willing to help me? Thanks!

Loulou

[pendean]

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@loulouv18 wrote:

Hi, I'm also trying to create a tri-axial ellipsoid but in Inventor. 

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The INVENTOR forum is over here https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/inventor-forum/bd-p/78

If you want others to look at this post for reference then just add a link to it in your post over at Inventor' forum.

HTH

[cadman777]

I saw this in the Inventor forum.

I'm an Inventor user.

Here's a tip when using Inventor:
It doesn't work like AutoCAD (before Inventor, I was a long-time AutoCAD user).

So you have to approach modeling differently in Inventor.

Hope this helps.

[chasbosc]

I can't begin to thank you enough for this solution!!