Breaking in to Heljan 33

[New Haven Neil]

Hi

 

Does anyone have any handy hints on getting the body shell off the latest Heljan 33 please?  I can spring the sides away but it refuses to release from the chassis!

 

I fitted a decoder to this a few months ago so I must have been able to get into it then, but the running is odd, it seems to have a mind of its own regarding speed control despite a lot of cv fiddling.  So a different decoder is in order, but can I as hell get into it!

 

I must find out what decoder it is, I have a US diesel that displays similar behaviour and I'm interested to see if its the same decoder.  Of course I can't remember what they are.....middle age!

 

Thanks

 

Neil

[Trains4U]

Pull harder... (And hope nothing breaks off)

[New Haven Neil]

That's the bit I'm worried about, Gareth!  It is Heljan after all, bits fall off on their own!

[Trains4U]

In seriousness, if you have some plasticard, slide it between bodyshell and tabs, then gently (But forcibly) pull at the bogies - perhaps alternately to "Wiggle" the chassis out.

You may want to take the bogie sideframes off first.

[Nile_Griffith]

Old hotel plastic key cards cut into four strips and teased between the chassis and the body, or if you have the drop on one a plastic washing up liquid bottle cut up into strips......... and then show it who is boss!!!

[New Haven Neil]

No secret things then, just the usual - and a particularly tight fit!  I'm used to dropping chassis out of body shells, this particular one is just a complete swine.  Thanks for the advice, I'll just have to get rougher with it.  I had some plasticard slips in it, but it seemed to be held at the bufferbeam ends, I was living in hope I'd missed something.  Ah well, tomorrow I'll just give it some stick - it'll probably end up looking like a Hornby 31 with Mazak cancer.

[SRman]

The newer 33 bodies are clipped at exactly the same points as the old ones, with four points near the cab doors. The new ones are simply a lot tighter fit than the old.

[Clive Mortimore]

Breaking into a Heljan loco.

 

You need a hammer and a phone.

1,Tap the loco roof quite hard with the hammer.

2,Then call this number 01865 848000 

3, Ask the nice Mr Howe if he has a spare body to replace the one you have just dropped and broken.

4, Cry very loudly when he says "No, you are the 24th person today who has been stupid enough to follow the instructions on RMweb."

 

 

 

Hat..... coat....... "Bye"

[Guest]

To get into my new Heljan 33, I cut my wife's credit card into four pieces. An unexpected upside is that as a family, we're now a little wealthier. Without a new pair of shoes appearing each week, there's also a little more room in the wardrobe for my stuff.

 

Edit: Joking aside, an old credit, debit or store card is exactly the right thickness and gives some a decent amount of leverage when gently prising the body away from the chassis.

Edited January 9, 2016 by Pete 75C

[Barry O]

If you think they are bad try a CoBo.... But I now use 4 cards and hold onto the buffers to try and get the chassis out.

 

Have you tried to get the rubber light cover inserts out from between the chassis and the body?

Baz

[Gwiwer]

Agree with the others here.  The latest tooling makes it much harder to remove the body but they do come away exactly as the older ones did.  Unclip the lugs (and keep them open with a shim of card) and prise the body away.  It's a very tight fit so go carefully but be aware you are likely to need some force.  There is nothing at the ends to unclip or locking the ends to the frame despite what may seem to be the case.

[ColinK]

Be carefull pulling by the bogies. There is a cross member which holds the bogies into the chassis which you don't want to break. It can be replaced, but its a pain to do. One broke on my class 26.

 

I've a couple of new 27s arriving soon, presumably they open the same way?

[71H]

For my Heljan class 33, i used two old so called 'loyalty cards' from supermarkets.

 

I filed one end of each at an angle (75 degrees roughly) so they could get between the body & the chassis easily.   It works all the time that i have to remove bodies (model ones, not humans)

 

Very carefully & gently, you can remove the body, but do not force it to much...............for obvious reasons.

 

Good luck

 

andy

[JSpencer]

Perhaps place it in a cold room first in older to shrink the metal chassis a bit.

 

Just an idea....

[Bert Cheese]

Perhaps place it in a cold room first in older to shrink the metal chassis a bit.

 

Just an idea....

It'll probably "explode" as the bits of rust and discarded staples within the mazak mix contract at different rates...allegedly.

The last Heljan loco I dared to dismantle was one of my Claytons (motor problems!) which resulted in bits of plastic flying in all directions and a slight huff, its now mostly complete but relegated to the "wish I'd never bought it" fleet.

 

That aside I've just totted up and realised I have 23 Heljan diesels altogether, the majority of which I am still very happy with, no one can get  everything right I suppose?

[SRman]

Like all the manufacturers, Heljan occasionally get one wrong or have manufacturing defects (mazak rot?), but overall I like their locomotives and particularly their mechanisms. I bought a few of the earlier class 33/0 locos with the flatter roof profile. They still looked much more like a 33 than the Lima models from many years earlier, and were improved by filing the cab roofs into a more rounded profile to disguise the flatter shape with "shoulders".

Like you, Bert Cheese, I have now accumulated quite a few of their models, including one of the dreaded class 17. I did a quick count of mine and found I have 22 Heljan locos. Only one of these is the later class 33/0 models (in the 34xx catalogue series) and getting the body off that without damaging any of the underframe details was quite a challenge!

[JSpencer]

I have:

One each: class 14, 15, 17, 28, 35, lion, Kesral, DP2, Beyer Garret, EM1

Two each 23

 

One each early 33, 33/1, 33/2

One latest 33, with early roof profile (this is the best 33 out there), two latest 33 with later roof profile that they made a mess of.

 

Total 18

 

One 23, 35 and one latest 33 with late roof converted to DCC sound. The 33 was a pig cert but not much more complex than the 23.

[jjb1970]

I know when I chipped my Heljan 33 it needed nerves of steel as the amount of force it required was silly, eventually I just decided to go for it and hope for the best. Really there is no reason why chipping models should be like that, Bachmann showed how it can be done with their Desiro model and even if you have to remove the body I think the things could be designed to be a bit easier than some of them currently are.

[New Haven Neil]

I got back to this today, and being more brave got the body off - Bachmann (therefore soundtraxx?) decoder removed, and a Hornby Sapphire put in as I wanted to try one out of curiosity - wonder who makes those?  Running issues solved, much better.  Then, getting the body back on was just as bad, there appears to be a lip on each bufferbeam that needs to go inside the shell - tightly! Got there in the end, but I won't be opening that back up in a hurry.

[Stevelewis]

If you think they are bad try a CoBo.... But I now use 4 cards and hold onto the buffers to try and get the chassis out.

 

Have you tried to get the rubber light cover inserts out from between the chassis and the body?

Baz

I have  done  3  or  4  C0-B0s  the  first  2  when  the  models  were  released  were  easy  to  do,  but later on  3  was  quite  difficiult  and   no: 4  resulted  in  a  box  of  parts  and  a    tube  of  glue  to  make  it    look anything like  OK    Oh  and  a  lot  of  heavy  weathering!

[JSpencer]

I have  done  3  or  4  C0-B0s  the  first  2  when  the  models  were  released  were  easy  to  do,  but later on  3  was  quite  difficiult  and   no: 4  resulted  in  a  box  of  parts  and  a    tube  of  glue  to  make  it    look anything like  OK    Oh  and  a  lot  of  heavy  weathering!

I hope that is not the first signs of the zinc pest appearing.

[Stevelewis]

I hope that is not the first signs of the zinc pest appearing.

That is  a  good  point, not  sure how  long  the Zinc  problem takes to occur  but  i  suppose  there  was  around 2+ years in the time difference, when  I  removed the  superstructures from numbers 3 & 4,  Would storage conditions affect  the  process I wonder?

[JSpencer]

That is a good point, not sure how long the Zinc problem takes to occur but i suppose there was around 2+ years in the time difference, when I removed the superstructures from numbers 3 & 4, Would storage conditions affect the process I wonder?

Yes, cold humid places greatly accelerate the process. If I was super rich, I would probably stick one a fridge for a month just to see what happens.

 

Likewise plastic might become stiffer and brittle with age depending on its quality though that would heat related, a lot of light and open air.

 

Hornby UK made items used polystyrene made by ICI which was dam good stuff, really tough and hard to break even when old. Lima plastic at the time, also polystyrene was brittle. The new plastics that Hornby and Heljan use look a tad better than Lima but still far short of Hornby's UK made stuff.

Edited January 18, 2016 by JSpencer

[Butler Henderson]

Found I could slip a fingernail between the body and chassis at the cab end and then could slip chopped up plastic cards in between .

Need to do this both sides before slipping the body off. Incidentally mine has the same set of instructions duplicated in it, they have a thank you page, dcc decoder location, exploded parts list and a potted history of the class. Should I have had another different sheet as well?

Edited April 1, 2019 by Butler Henderson

[philiprporter]

Just seen this having wrestled for an hour to get the wretched bodyshell off - managed to slip and trash one of the radiator grilles, as the force needed to get the clips away from the body is absolutely ridiculous!  The lugs on the inside of the shell are massive and I'm amazed the body shell can flex enough without cracking - its a really bad design - I'm going to file them down a bit to see if that makes things better.