Hello, I’m new to unreal and game design in general. I made a gun in 3ds max and its looks great but when i import it into unreal 4 it adds weird smoothing glitches. I’ve tried to remodel it, and mess with the smoothing in max but nothing seems to help. I have also gotten some error while importing that i don’t know how to fix.
ok DON’T use booleans to cut holes as this causes more problems later, use the slice/knife tool to add extra edges then delete the inner polys select the ring edges and use bridge.
smoothing try auto set to 30 or 45
create a uvw map
make sure you “bones” and mesh pivots are aligned to world before you skin (x = forward , z = up)
on export make sure you tick the box “smooth groups”
sorry no pic as i don’t have max anymore, just working off a very bad memory 
Seems you are new to modelling itself too, wierd considering 3dsmax is $$$'s (unless you’re using student version ofc :P). It triangulates the mesh when exporting, you cannot have floating holes in the middle of a mesh. Without trying to sound harsh, you need to read up on the basics of game modelling before you do something like this, learn to walk before you jump. We all need to start somewhere and it is a good start…
thank you this is very helpful
I’ve been trying to but I don’t know how to go about it. I’ve watched a lot of videos about it.
Make sure that export smoothing groups is checked in the exporter. If checked then the object does not have any smoothing ID’s applied (ie all surfaces are 0). The muzzle of your gun for example it’s clear that there is no smoothing information so that is the part the importer might be complaining about.
Booleans is ok
but
You will need to clean up the result as it creates additional vertices which causes unusual smoothing problems. OK for prep work but “NOT” as a fit to finish tool.
If possible maintain quads as smoothing in 3ds Max is based on angle from one quad surface to another. This is the baulk of your problem as the smoothing is being calculated across face surfaces on the planer and not across the quad based on angle.
P.S. your in the ballpark so the solution to figuring it out is not how to use the tool but how it works in the first place and you have the beginnings of a real nice looking gun.