visibility of LOD DAE object in Three JS - three.js

Question

i'm trying to use the THREE.LOD object in my ThreeJS scene. i've been inspired by http://threejs.org/examples/webgl_lod.html
But I wanted to push the idea further and use DAE model (using this loader : http://threejs.org/examples/webgl_loader_collada.html)
Problem is i can't switch the visibility of the lod level. First, i tried an automated one in my Render function (based on distance to camera, found in the example):
this.m_Scene.traverse( function ( object ) {
if ( object instanceof THREE.LOD ) {
object.update( that.m_Camera );
}
} );
As it wasn't working (All my lod were displayed at the same time). I try something more manual. and it appears the Object3D.visibility attribute isn't really used by the renderer, or not inherited by children.
As far as I understand, this attribute is for meshes. But i'm not sure it's checked at render time.
So this doesn't work as expected:
var LodTemporaryObject = new THREE.LOD();
function LoadLod1()
{
//TEST COLLADA LOADER
var loader = new THREE.ColladaLoader();
loader.options.convertUpAxis = true;
loader.load(Lod2Path, function ( collada ) {
dae = collada.scene;
dae.scale.x = dae.scale.y = dae.scale.z = 0.1;
dae.updateMatrix();
dae.visible = false; //THIS HAS NO EFFECT
LodTemporaryObject.addLevel(dae,100);
AddLodToScene(LodTemporaryObject ); //where the lod is added to the threeJS scene object
} );
}
so question : how do I actually set (in)visible any Object3D or subScene ?

Answer 1

EDIT: The answer below is outdated. Visibility is now inherited. See, for example, Show children of invisible parents.
three.js r.71
Visibility is not inherited by children with WebGLRenderer.
The work-around is to use a pattern like so:
object.traverse( function( child ) {
if ( child instanceof THREE.Mesh ) {
child.visible = false;
}
}
three.js r.64

Answer 2

Thx to WestLangley answer above, i came up with an recursive solution to my problem:
first, a recursive function to update visibility of children to match the parent's:
function SetChildrenVisible(parent)
{
if(parent instanceof THREE.Object3D)
{
for(var i = 0; i< parent.children.length; i ++)
{
parent.children[i].visible = parent.visible;
SetChildrenVisible(parent.children[i]);
}
}
}
then in my render loop:
this.m_Scene.traverse( function ( object ) {
if ( object instanceof THREE.LOD ) {
//save all lodLevel state before updating
var oldVisible =[]; object.visible;
for(var i = 0; i< object.children.length; i++)
{
oldVisible.push(object.children[i].visible)
}
//Update Lod
object.update( that.m_Camera );
//Check for changes and update accordingly
for(var i = 0; i< object.children.length; i++)
{
if(oldVisible[i] != object.children[i].visible )
{
SetChildrenVisible(object.children[i]);
}
}
}
} );
Goal is to only update object whose attribute changed.