Selection tool problems. (

So we are having a problem with the selection tools.  Though trying to select the object on screen isn't working either. 

When I try to select the main pipe body "Cylinder01" it selects the whole group, mostly.  For some reason it is leaving one object out of the selection.  Well, I actually want to only select one object.  When I do however the whole group is selected.  The only exception is the bottom most object in the list.  it's always excluded and I can select that one by it's self.  I've un-grouped and re-grouped them a few times, and it doedn't matter what object is on the bottom, that one is always separate.  This is just confusing me.  I want to be able to select each part of that group singly like the object on the bottom of the stack instead of as a group like when I choose any other object. 

I can get them all to group, by un-grouping them and then using Max to group them from the pull down list instead of using Esphere.  But, even then I can not select individual objects from that group.   Any ideas?