7mm MMP CLass 56 in S7

I bought an MMP Class 56 from Mickoo a bout 2 years ago now and have been itching to build it if I'm being honest.
So I made a start in Chicago this week on the bogies



The bogie frames come in 4 main pieces, a top a bottom and two sides, there is a half etched line where the sides "clip" in to. The sides are handed and the top and bottom are not flat there are some subtle bend to make on the bottom and some more obvious ones on the top that match the profile of the sides. Folding this requires a considerable amount of care, it's very easy to get this slightly wrong and find that it doesn't fit. It does fit perfectly you just need to bend everything perfectly to get it to fit perfectly.

Then you have to solder it up, I used some old slater's plastic wagon wheel bearing boxes to hold the parts while I did the soldering to avoid too many burnt fingers.



I started by fitting the sides to the top. You make the bends in the top easily and get those to fit the sides.
I then found the easiest way to do this was to hold the side in the half etched line then bend the front round until it clipped in place, then you could tack solder it in place. Then try and fold round the other end and get that to clip in place and be perfectly square.









It all ends up very nice indeed.

Fortunately this is one of the kits covered on Building O Gauge online so lots of help there.

Richard

Looking forward to this Richard.


Ken

This week I'm in Singapore and therefore totally jet lagged it is almost 3am in the morning here as I write this and I still don't feel tired.

So plenty of time to work on the 56. The bogie contain numerous castings and some requisite etchings that all need cleaning or careful removal from the fret so that is the task over the next few days.

Here are 6 of the air brake cylinders that go on the side of the bogie, there are 24 in total



The castings are of excellent quality just requiring a few strokes with a file to clean up the casting sprues.

Then each cylinder requires one of these to be fitted to its end.



So I need 24 of these each one carefully cut out of the etch with scissors and cleaned up with a file.

Here are some cleaned up ones.



Fortunately there are 4 spares on the etch just in case

I have decided to super glue these to the cylinders



Here's the first 12 waiting for the glue to set.

Here are some other etches for the bogie.



These are the cab steps and something to do with the brakes according to the instructions, but Building OGO didn't know what they were and reckoned they had been removed by the end of the 80s.

Richard,
I think the compensation beams between the springs are not in the kit either. I'll have to check - I did a fret of a load of bits for the 56 and I need to remind myself what was on there. I didn't do too much with it as I couldn't work out a way to do the cantrail grilles in a way I was going to be happy.

Steph

Steph Dale said:

I think the compensation beams between the springs are not in the kit either.

Click to expand...

Indeed they are! Both front and back.

Thanks David,
I'll have to check and remind myself what I did. I remember something about CSBs, but not 100% about what else was on there...

Steph

Steph Dale said:

Thanks David,
I'll have to check and remind myself what I did. I remember something about CSBs, but not 100% about what else was on there...

Steph

Click to expand...

Steph,

I wasn't talking about your fret - I didn't even know you did one! I was correcting your assertion that there were no compensation beams in our MMP kit. As far as the roof grilles go - well you have obviously seen Simon Varman's build, and so I would certainly not have imagined them to be beyond your own capability.

Richard,

The smaller linkage parts on the n/s fret that mystify you are indeed linkage parts that I cannot see on any Class 56s later in life but are certainly visible in some earlier photos and on the works drawing for the bogie that I had free of charge from BREL [curse privatisation!]. They are possibly visible on a photo in the kit instructions but I'm not 100% sure about that. I have a black and white works photo of a bogie under construction showing them - so we put 'em in.

David,
I think we're talking at crossed purposes! I don't believe the MMP kit has the cosmetic compensation beams fitted to the external bogie frames. I do think they have the internal ones for the wheels to run in. I just subverted them to work as CSB mountings.

That paragraph is either useful clarification or pointless tautology. I'm hoping the former...

Steph

Steph Dale said:

David,
I think we're talking at crossed purposes! I don't believe the MMP kit has the cosmetic compensation beams fitted to the external bogie frames. I do think they have the internal ones for the wheels to run in. I just subverted them to work as CSB mountings.

That paragraph is either useful clarification or pointless tautology. I'm hoping the former...

Steph

Click to expand...

Steph,

No I don't think we are - I'm talking about the beams that connect the springs - two per axlebox - one behind the springs and one in front of the springs. If it is not these beams [which are in the kit - and some of which are visible on one of the brass frets in the second photo down in this thread] then perhaps you can put a photo up of what you mean. It would be almost impossible to constuct a decent replica of a Class 56 bogie without the beams I'm referring to - it would just look ridiculous and nothing like the real thing. If not those it must be something virtually invisible, because as far as I can recall, we put pretty much everything visible into those bogies.

Also not sure what you mean by "I just subverted them to work as CSB mountings". Are you referring to an online build you did?

David,
I have to confess, I'm not seeing it in Richard's photo, but it's a relatively small detail - just a bit of a light blocker. Highlighted in red:

The original photo is one of Brian Daniels', here: 56090 (09)

In terms of what I did, here's the fret:

Left to right; secondary suspension yoke, primary suspension arms and the compensation beams, drilling jig for CSB pivots, bogie frame mounting (to replace that unfortunately lost when the secondary suspension takes up the same space), cab bulkheads for some locos (later refurbished versions perhaps?).

I didn't get as far as doing an on-line build and in fact only got to test building enough to check it worked as intended. I got rather overtaken by events. Hopefully I'll get back to it in a few months as it's something that wanders through my mind periodically. So do a pair of your Class 60 kits I'm itching to build!

To be honest, the only reason I mentioned it here was to see if Richard thinks he'll find any of the parts useful in which case I could lob one of the test etches off to him. The CSB is probably a non-starter though as I don't think I'd have time to do the instructions to explain how it all fits together.

Steph

Steph Dale said:

David,
I have to confess, I'm not seeing it in Richard's photo, but it's a relatively small detail - just a bit of a light blocker. Highlighted in red:
View attachment 81388
The original photo is one of Brian Daniels', here: 56090 (09)

In terms of what I did, here's the fret:
View attachment 81389
Left to right; secondary suspension yoke, primary suspension arms and the compensation beams, drilling jig for CSB pivots, bogie frame mounting (to replace that unfortunately lost when the secondary suspension takes up the same space), cab bulkheads for some locos (later refurbished versions perhaps?).

I didn't get as far as doing an on-line build and in fact only got to test building enough to check it worked as intended. I got rather overtaken by events. Hopefully I'll get back to it in a few months as it's something that wanders through my mind periodically. So do a pair of your Class 60 kits I'm itching to build!

To be honest, the only reason I mentioned it here was to see if Richard thinks he'll find any of the parts useful in which case I could lob one of the test etches off to him. The CSB is probably a non-starter though as I don't think I'd have time to do the instructions to explain how it all fits together.

Steph

Click to expand...

Ah! All is clear now - Thanks. I thought you mean't the beams at the bottom of the axleboxes! I did consider those but thought it was over-kill as we do get accused of putting too much in.

Yeah well...

I do occasionally play around with ideas for floating the drive in the traction motors, allowing all the suspension and other detail to work as the real things. Like you I suspect I'd be accused of doing too much, but there's some nice, functional, EE 8'6" bogies in the computer all ready for a rainy day.

Steph

Thank you both

Steph I can mange without your additional sheet, as David has said there is already plenty of detail in the kit as it is supplied.

Richard

Aah, fair enough! I shall enjoy watching your build.

Steph

I'll enjoy watching your build Richard. How do you manage to get through airport security with all those sharps in your tool box?

Cheers

Tom

Tom

They go in checked luggage, otherwise you would get arrested and locked up especially in the US !

Richard

This is looking great.

I spend alot of my time these days in hotels too and its great to pass the time with a project!!

I'm looking forward to more updates

Cheers
Will

Work has been progressing slowly. I have decided to leave doing any more on the bogies as this can all be glued together and therefore done on my travels.
So I decided to make a start on the main body.



Here's the big etch, on the top edges you need to fold over the roof fixing by 90 degrees, the tricky thing is that where the large gap for the side grills is, there is not a lot of metal to get hold of. I tried using pliers but this didn't work as well as I wanted.



You can see it better in this one.






It isn't fully folded here and it is going to twist the remainder of the side.

So this was acquired to deal with the problem.



Its a monster but it does the job.
Here's the etch in position for folding.



You can now see how the first part I didisn't done properly.
You cannot use the folding arm on this as the cab ends get in the way so you need to use a ruler.



You can now use the ruler to make the fold with everything clamped firmly in right place.
I then did the second side and then the big fold for the body side to get this.



It's not finished yet thoug, more in the next post.

Work has been progressing well over the past week.

The first thing to finish off was the body. It is not quite as simple as it looks. The body has a 45 degree bend at the bottom (confirmed by a quick note to Mr P himself) it doesn't really show in hptpgraphs so it is tempting to think the body is just flat. There are 2 etched lines on the body floor about 1.5mm apart tha enable you to make this 45 degree fold. Just using the folding bars on one side made part of the required angle but it does require fianl finishing off by hand to get it right. If you don't do it the cab inners won't fit so they can be used as a guide to tell you when the width is correct. This doesn't get covered on the building O gauge site and there isn't much int he instructions about it either.



You can clearly see the required 45 degree fold here and here

richard carr said:

Work has been progressing well over the past week.

The first thing to finish off was the body. It is not quite as simple as it looks. The body has a 45 degree bend at the bottom (confirmed by a quick note to Mr P himself) it doesn't really show in hptpgraphs so it is tempting to think the body is just flat. There are 2 etched lines on the body floor about 1.5mm apart tha enable you to make this 45 degree fold. Just using the folding bars on one side made part of the required angle but it does require fianl finishing off by hand to get it right. If you don't do it the cab inners won't fit so they can be used as a guide to tell you when the width is correct. This doesn't get covered on the building O gauge site and there isn't much int he instructions about it either.

View attachment 82379

You can clearly see the required 45 degree fold here and here

View attachment 82380

Click to expand...

I don't know how you can reasonably say that Richard - I sent you a link to a really good side-on photo in Simon's online build whick shows it very very clearly and proves that he does include it. Did you not get my message? It is also clearly shown on page one of the assembly drawings in the kit instructions.

If you just form the sides up on something as simple as the edge of a wooden table in one go, the folds just follow through naturally to include the angled section. When I used to form the bodies in kits I only used the flat of my hand to make the fold. It was as simple as that.

If you follow Simon's online build you won't go far wrong, including making a nice job of the roof grilles.

When the kits come back out, everything will be formed in terms of the body, front ends and roof panels. It is just simpler it seems.

DJP/MMP