Sharing animations between models in Mecanim

So, basically we are importing model and animations as FBX files, it all works fine as long as the model and animations are imported together in the same FBX.
Any animations imported separately (for exactly the same rig&model) don’t work. I put them into the Animation Controller, they appear to be playing (blue bar is going up) but the character in the scene is not affected by them.
Rig is Generic.
Any clues greatly appreciated !

Animation FBX files need to have an identical skeleton hierarchy to the skinned fbx model if you import separately, you’d do well to use the @clipname convention also. You can compare the hierarchies by validating your FBX in your source package. Alternatively you can use the re-targeting feature of Humanoid to playback any animation on a similar (but not identical ) humanoid model. Further info here:

http://docs.unity3d.com/Manual/MecanimAnimationSystem.html