Combining Many Nurbs Surfaces Down Into One Object

[unionj9]

Does anybody know how to combine or merge many nurbs surfaces down into one object in Maya?

I have grouped the 25+ nurbs surfaces and arranged them properly in my outliner so they move, rotate, scale as one object, but I can still click on any part of it and delete, or move that single piece. I want one object.

I am creating a white fluffy dandelion. I have about 25 nurbs cylinders going into a bud, then the stem and a few other surfaces. Right now I am duplicating this group over and over to make the dandelion, but it is slowing down my G5 Mac (4gb ram) and crashes often so I'm thinking if I can make all of those 25 nurbs cylinders, etc. one object in the sense where I cannot manipulate any of the pieces, just the object itself, then it won't keep crashing. I'm looking for the pre-compose function of After Effects in Maya.

[gmask]

convert to polys then combine

[pixl]

You can use parent -r -s (shape node) to parent shape nodes to a different transform.
This can probably be done more easily w/code, but here is the non-code method:
In the outliner, turn on Display>Shapes.
Select the shape nodes (not the transform) of all the nodes (except one) that you want to combine, then select the transform node of the last one. In MEL, use:
parent -r -s.

All of the shape nodes will be combined under one transform. You might want to freeze transform and then center pivot. You can continue to edit this new object the same as you would the individual surfaces. You can delete all the empty transforms.

This might not help your performance issues as you still dealing w/the same number of surfaces - maybe you can make them less dense or convert to polygonal?