hi michael,

here is the file with a distroted base shape. it is quadrangualar, i think for a triangular base shape it is always possible to find a sphere that touches all the edges. i think the solution from val 2 illustrates that really well, it looks like alle the vaults are fitting together perfectly. maybe next time i ll create a design based on triangular vaults.

i tried to use your approach for the quadrangular distorted base shape and created an irregluar circle and i think it works quite nicely, but the sides of the vault don t match the original curves exactly, similar to your example. it would be difficult to have several vaults next to each other that match perfectly (screenshot distorted vaults 01 and 02). maybe a solution for this problem can be constructed, but my math skills are simply not good enough, which is why i worked around it in c4d with sub division modelling.

thanks again to everyone for posting different solutions to my problem, i didn t expect so much help it is really appreciated!!


kind regards
john

Why not Rail Revolve ?
Height as you want : Arcs by 3 Points

One for the ellipse, one for the circle
then Union, then Thickness then Fillet

Here 2 differents heights

Hi john, thanks for posting that. Yes I would probably go with subdivision surface modeling for doing that.

For doing it in NURBS it would work better to change how you're specifying the structure, you'd want to set up dome shapes and have the final edges be created by intersections between the domes rather than starting out with those edges and trying to surface those. If you had all 4-sided areas you could do it by surfacing but it will be difficult with 3 sided areas included. Subdivision surfaces are good at dealing with adapting to topology changes like that.

- Michael