Posts tagged 'compass-construction'

F.17 Ellipse

Given semi-major axis a and semi-minor axis b, a four-center circular-arc oval approximating the ellipse x^2/a^2 + y^2/b^2 = 1 is constructed by a 7-step five-circle compass procedure, while the exact conic satisfies F = a*e, d = a/e, and vertex mean proportional V = a = sqrt(d*F).