In the meantime, have you ever watched the Brodie Fairhall video I mention in a sibling comment?
The shapebinder technique near the end of this video is amazing!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yp6cIMA7LsI
And there's another clever technique using variant links (which you can take a bit further with BaseFeatures):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m9C_ahIVKOI
It's funny. People describe FreeCAD as maddening or sadistic, and for sure there are elements of the workflow that are frustrating (I'd be happy if I could do the five things I use the Draft workbench for without ever having to open it), but at the same time, it's so liberating and enthralling once you get your head into its way of thinking.
For me it's like QGIS or Inkscape: it's mindblowing that this tool is available to me for free. The trivial things I've been able to do have really changed my life (and I don't mean to overstate that -- these are things I never thought I'd learn and the impacts on my creativity have been striking).