Really never remember experiencing this.  I know you can edit parts within the

context of an assembly with it creating external references, but does anyone know

of a way to mate a part that is inserted into one sub-assembly to another part that is

in the assembly  next level assembly?  Basically this part in the sub assembly would

be fully defined using mates that cross over into 2 assemblies.

I am thinking this is not possible, short of using distance mates and giving it the look

as though it is mated like I described.

But I thought I would throw it out to you guys for thoughts or to see if there is a way.