I have a mechanical leg that I’ve rigged (with IK) in Blender that I want to import into UE5 as a skeletal mesh and build a control rig for. I’ve looked at just about every tutorial out there on how to do this, but every time I export my armature + the mesh, it just imports all the parts as separate static meshes, and doesn’t even import the armature at all. I don’t know what I’m doing wrong. Here’s the link to my blender project: test.blend - Google Drive
Hey even though this post is a month old I was just searching for a similar thing - so hope this at least help someone else dealing with the same issue.
I haven’t tried your blend project, but I assume since you say it’s mechanical, that you rigged the mesh by simply parenting it to the bone without any armature deformation.
I was just dealing with the same thing, and could not find any answer for this why it does not work. All the AI tools telling me this should totally work (I guess they are wrong, or there is some option that can fix this not set by default in either Blender or Unreal).
How to fix this: You have to parent your mesh to the bone with Armature Deform - if its hard surface mesh you have to set all Vertices weights to 1. Then it should get Imported to Unreal Engine with Skeletal Mesh.
I have only answer how to fix the issue - but no answer why it does not work by simply parenting it to the bone - if anybody else stumbles upon this post and explain it to me I will be very glad.
Hello. I’m having exactly this problem, and haven’t been able to fix it in blender! The rig works great in Blender (it’s a crankshaft and pistons), but when I bring it into Unreal, all the pivot points are in the same place, and there is no skeletal mesh / rig etc! I have no idea how to get Unreal to have the same simple rig with a simple rotation controller. Would you mind expanding on your response? Thanks for answering this in the first place. Super useful.
wherever u are, whoever u are… THNK U!!!