I have the problem that the meshes deform when I want to move the armature while they are not connected to the mesh visually in the vertex groups. The mesh exists out of different compound meshes, like spheres and tubes and cubes, because I can not post the blend file here I discribe this only. I wanted to let it look like mechanically but it did not work. I was busy trying the action constraints, but I am not very busy with it every day.
Wel, I guess this is another difficult understandeble problem, but I wil do my best to understand it.
It sounds like your meshes may be being deformed with envelopes.
For mechanical style rigging, it’s often easiest to simply use bone parenting, rather than an armature modifier. To do this, select the armature, go into pose mode, then select the object you want to rig (you should not have an armature modifier on the object) and then shift-select the armature, so that your object and your armature are both selected, with the armature in pose mode. Select the bone you want to parent to and press ctrl-P, and select “parent to bone”. Your object will follow the bone like an ordinary object child, without deforming.
