The volumetric representations of deformable objects suffer from high memory and computational costs. In this work we analyze an approach of constructing low-resolution mass spring models (MSMs) on the basis of a high-resolution reference MSM. Preserving the physical properties of the modeled objects is emphasized such that their motion is consistent and independent of the spring network resolution. We varied the node merging algorithm and analyzed how various aspects of the simplification process affected the properties of the model and how these properties translated into visual behavior in a simulation.