A quick detour from the Thompson to another bit of Ultima stuff. The sides, roof and ends are not a problem but the original aluminium floor is long deceased. Worse than that the price quotes I've got for a new die to extrude the stuff are not really viable with the Dapol Gresley stock on the market, nor would have space to store the typical "minimum order"

So to see what was needed and as a planning aide I cut a floor out of 1mm plasticard 117mm x 16mm to go with the roof and ends. Then I stuck 3mm or so square plastic rod each side between the ends and stepped slightly out to line up with the profile on the ends both to give the sides somewhere to sit and to stop the chassis from bending. The solebars are plastic U channel about 2mm high and the rest of the underframe is Ultima parts built to the original instructions.

No bogie mounts yet (or bogies in fact) but one problem at a time. I also need to work out which interior strip goes with each coach, which isn't helped by the fact they are labelled by some old numbering system with things like "N27".

When it comes to teak printed sides are a definite winner even when not yet stuck down (need to paint the rest first)