Thank you Daniele, I was already afraid that it wouldn't be possible. The 'chained' part hadn't percolated in my brain yet.
I started with a pin as a hinge on the left (wall) side of a step fixed in the left wall side upright. Of course I could swivel the step up and down as expected. I then added a second hinge on the same step on the right side. The step including the second hinge moved as expected. From there I ran into problems:
I added the right side upright placing it so the right pin-hinge was fixed in that side. I could still move the step but of course the right upright didn't stay vertical as I wanted but swiveled with the step. So I added the opening_on_hinge_2_ string for the second pin to the already present opening_on_hinge_1_ on the right upright. I hoped that adding the second opening_on would follow the movement for the second pin AND the first pin, but alas, I couldn't even import the object with those strings.
I suspect that the "sweethome3d_opening_on_hinge_1_and_sweethome3d_opening_on_hinge_2_1" as set on the right upright was the culprit, although I hoped it would work from what I read here: http://www.sweethome3d.com/support/forum/viewthread_thread,11818
As you said, it's a chain and what I want is (currently) not possible. For now I more or less 'solved' it by pulling the right side out as a drawer but that of course requires a wall behind it where it can go into without sticking out at the other side. Fortunately in my current project I can do that because it alignes with a wall on the inside.
I think the design for the escape ladder is incredible. You don't see large ugly stairs and it can't be used by burglars because it's locked closed. It takes up so little space. Only at the top can it be opened by pulling a pin that locks the two sides together. A really smart design. And I wanted to create it as very little part of my current huge project.
The mechanical constraints shoudn't be a problem in itself. There are other programs that do similar things so technically it's possible. But it might run into the limitations with the current code. It would be nice though if you can pose a mannequin arm by moving the hand
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