Hi again.....I've continued to work on the problem, and I've just about got it done. There is one problem left.

The best method so far is to save my file to pdf and send it to the printer. The printer opens it in Illustrator. Everthing is good and of high quality, except for the objects that were orginally created in Illustrator with the Mesh Tool. Those objects have a grid pattern on them which displays when I open the AI file in Inkscape, and they continue to display the grid in any format I save to. I can mask it if I blur the objects, but then they don't display when the printer opens the file....the objects just disappear.

Is there a way to deal with this grid? Thanks again.....

[moderator edit -- this is a continuation of this topic: viewtopic.php?f=22&t=9063]

I forgot that I could have bumped the previous thread on this subject just by adding the update there. Might as well stay on this one.....

Did you try "Rasterize effects" in the Inkscape PDF dialogue?
Other option could be ALT+B, it creates a Bitmap copy of the selection, then you can save your PDF again; your file is for print, so be sure to set the resolution of bitmap clones to 300dpi in the Inkscape preferences. This is a workaround to maintain appearance in the prinb output.

Acrobat Reader show the Mesh Objects?

Yes, I had already rasterized the filters. Then I used Alt-B on the grid objects. Then I saved as pdf. The file opens completely in Adobe Reader, but the grid is there. I just heard back from the printer, and everything is good in the pdf except the objects that the Mesh Tool was used on.

The Mesh Tool allowed the original graphics guy to create objects that had depth, dimension, and multiple colors that weren't achieveable with a simple gradient. The results are terrific, but it seems that Inkscape can't handle it.