The gate is meshed, the fence it's for has been done for quite a while..the fence would really like to meet up with the gate. They've got this mutual attraction thing going on, lol.

I've searched, trust me. But I'm a bit confused- I understand that the animations have to be retained but I don't get how. What do I need to use? Once I know exactly what I should do/use, I'm sure I can get it from there. But if anyone wants to elaborate on the instructions a bit, that'd be great. Thanks.

The gate and posts are assigned to different joints. You will want to assign your gate and posts to those same joints. Typically the handle is also on the same joint as the gate and part of the hinge may be on the gate and post.

So, you use MS, but exporting as obj loses the joints. I right click / export on the resource (gives a funny hex name thing.5gd) then import into MS via sims2unimesh v49 thingy. Your joints will then be in MS and you can see which is which. Although you can also see this in SimPE. If you preview in the GMDC, on the right it show your joints. CLick on each one (different colors) then it will show which part of the mesh is assigned to that joint. Back to MS...Select your new gate and click the joint tab, then click the joint name/number as the one from EAxis is and click assign. Repeat for the posts. Then export the same way you imported, via the sims2unimesh v49 thingy. Again, in SimPE do the opposite to get back in. Right click the GMDC / Import, browse to your mesh.

And...if you know all that about joints. Sorry. I clearly misunderstood the question.

You didn't misunderstand at all, HL. Thanks for the instructions, you cleared a lot of my confusion up. *crosses fingers and hopes she can get it right*

Edit: Nope, I don't get it at all. I get the extracting as the hex# thingy from the GMDC, I get how to import that into MS. After that my brain turns to mush. I guess the only part I don't really get is how to assign the joints in MS- there's 0 to 4 in SimPE, 00h to 04h in MS. I take it 00h is the same as 0 and so on. 2 and 4 are the hinge and posts. Do I put the numbers from SimPE from the Joints tab in MS? I take it that's what I'm supposed to do, but I don't get how/where? Back to searching posts and tutorials I reckon.

Sorry about the double post- I still haven't figured out what I'm doing here! My edit in the post above explains where I'm having a problem. *sigh*

So 02h is hinge and 0h4 is post?

Select the hinge mesh part in MS. Select joint tab, select the 02h joint, then select the assign button below. Repeat for 04h joint and post. If you tick the box (on joints tab) to draw vertices with bone colors, your mesh should show the two joints in colors. You don't need to change anything regarding the joints names in MS or SimPE. You simply want to select mesh parts and assign to each joint.

If you want to send me the hex number mesh extract thingy, I can show you with pictures if you want.

Maybe I was over-thinking things? It sounds so simple now. I'll get around to trying this sometime tomorrow night. If I still can't get it, I'll send you the hex number thingamabob. Thanks again, HL!

Edit: The gate is done and it works perfectly.