What is the best way to build this parametrically in solidworks?

Question

I want to make a structure like the following

where:

• L is the total length and its fixed
• $\lambda$ is the distance between each arc
• n: is the number of repeated structures in the center

I have tried several ways to do that. The best two so far are both using a sweep along a line. One is using a Equation driven line and the other one is using arcs and a linear pattern, however in both cases I am missing something.

In general my specs are -ideally- the following. I want to :

• manage all parameters as global variables from the "Manage Equations"
• center the non straight structure
• define different $\lambda$, $n$
• have a fixed length L
• (if at all possible) not be limited to arcs but also more generic shapes, eg. triangles or squares.

Answer 1

I have a partial solution for this. By doing two opposing patterns of sketch blocks, rotated by 180 degrees to each other, and dimensioning the other sketch entities to fit around these, I can make a sketch which will update as you desire, including the more complex geometry, but unfortunately when you do an extrude, it creates disjoint bodies.

This is easily fixed by creating a new blank sketch, selecting the original sketch, and then pressing convert entities.

This can then handle parametric changes in the Lambda and the Length, but if you change the Number, then it will 'fall over'. It's quick to manually fix, just edit the sketch, CTRL+A to delete, select the origial, convert entities, rebuild. This could perhaps be assigned to a macro, set to run automatically on rebuild.

I have uploaded the file that I created for this demo here: http://www.filedropper.com/parameteriseddemo