I have been running into this error every so often where parts of my model will be inside out, and I usually just get around it by flipping my faces in the model or by using two-sided shaders, but I figured that I should probably learn what the proper fix is and what causes it in the first place.

In max, right-click the object and go to object proprieties, make sure back face cull is checked. That way you'll see in max which faces are flipped.
Otherwise, I don't think you're doing anything wrong... maybe try to model sealed meshes.

If you're using Bluestreak as an exporter I can say I also encounter this problem from time to time. Besides that it's incredibly annoying I can't say much else; I imagine it just incorrectly calculates face positioning sometimes. I just deal with it and flip the parts of my model that are broken.

Using the Rest Xform tool in 3ds also fixes it sometimes, but that can be inconvenient if I've got a skin modifier or similar already applied.
Edited by teh lag on Jul 3, 2011 at 11:07 PM

Thank you, the reset xform tool worked perfectly.