I have now fully glazed the windows, after earlier drilling and filing out the solid engine room side window apertures. I flush-glazed the windscreens a couple of years ago but I think I will have to redo one of them. I also painted the body at that time but have now finished off most of the details. An added refinement was to fit Bachmann sprung buffers. I still need to tidy a couple of rough patches on the light stripe along one side, and then give it a good coat of varnish, followed by a decent weathering.

The major operation was to fit the resin sideframes to the bogies. The kit was designed to fit the Lima Class 20 chassis but the Bachmann side frame attachments are slightly further apart lengthways which meant that the bogies became rather flimsy and delicate after the operation. One in particular broke off one end, which meant the clip-fitting mechanism didn't hold the frame assembly to the main structure of the bogie - because the coupling is attached to the frame, put a load behind it and it would fall off! I overcame this with a sort of cat's cradle of wire reinforcements and araldite which have proved quite successful, as the locomotive can now haul a train of wagons facing either way without dropping a bogie frame onto the track and derailing or just stopping dead!

I then added some 60 thou plasticard ends and bottom to the fuel tanks to give a more solid appearance, then coated the lot with matt black.

The photos show the result to date, although the camera flash has highlighted all the plastic filings still lodged in the side radiator grilles - I'll have to brush those out later!

The red thing in one of the engine room windows is the TCS MC2 decoder..