Creating a crank animation

[robives]

I'm trying to recreate an animation like this in Flash CS5.
Couple of questions:
Is it possible to simply lock the push rod (red) to the rotating wheel (yellow) so that I don't have to go through frame by frame repositioning it?
Is it possible to have the push rod slide through the slider tube automatically (Green) again so I don't have to reposition frame by frame.

Thanks in advance

[samac1068]

Not an expert, but sounds like you are trying to eliminate the animation part of the task. You will have to, either through actionscript or timeline, manually tell each part how to work since it isn't real. Looking at the animation you provided, it is clear that it was keyframed.

[goliard]

I would use Anime Studio for this. Has quite an intuitive bones system, and the latest version has some physics implementation. Distributed by Smith Micro.