As I am recovering from the back problems of the last week or so, I have now been able to start a few simple modelling projects - or continue with existing ones. I can only spend short times sitting at the workbench for now but things are improving rapidly.

Besides the class 350 conversion to class 450 mentioned elsewhere, I have finally, after much thought, come up with a way to level the LCDR brake van - it was previously sitting a little high at the compensated end. The solution was actually quite simple. The compensated unit rocks on a single piece of wire threaded through the cradle mounted on the underside of the wagon and the separate cradle carrying the 'W' irons and the wheels and springs. I removed the wire (it was only lightly glued in place), and removed the wheel/axle/'W' iron cradle assembly. I then used a drill the same size as the wire and hole in the wagon mounted assembly and drilled the holes upwards towards the floor, elongating them into slots by a little less than 1mm - this was by trial and error to get the ride height just right.

Once that was done I reinserted the wire through the two assemblies and all was well.

The other thing I did was to give the whole body a quick spray of grey undercoat, followed later by a thin coat of Humbrol blue-grey #79 as a base coat, to be followed by more thin coats of the same colour, before the final coat or two of the proper SECR grey can be applied.

I still have to sort out the brakes and brake gear. I have found the diagrams in the instructions almost incomprehensible, together with the brass 'wooden' brake shoes being too thin to be convincing, so I am going to rethink the brake blocks altogether, probably using plasticard, before I nut out the brake rigging.

Here are the progress shots; please remember that the colours are by no means final.