3ds Max Animation :: Separating Mesh And Maintaining Skin Modifier

I have a single-mesh model, pre-rigged and textured. I am trying to export it into a format which has a bone-limit of 59 bones per mesh. This model, however, has over 100 bones.
 
I'm really not very good at doing rigging from scratch; someone else rigged this for me. I need to split up the mesh, so the model meets the less-than-59-bones-per-mesh rule. 
 
Is there a way to do this without destroying the skin modifier, and having to re-skin the whole thing? I'd like it to end up as several meshes, which all work as one in terms of rigging.