Now for one of my smaller projects....

A few months ago I bought an F1/ F2 off of ebay. The body I thought was sublime but sadly the same couldn't be said of the chassis. In particular, the wheels were woefully under-sized.

I began by taking the wheels off (and ripping my fingers and thumbs basically to shreds in the process- who knew that bunt brass flanges make excellent knife blades?)

I then replaced them with spares from a Hornby M7, and fitted new connecting rods which are again Hornby spares, this time from their 08 shunter.

I then gave the loco a new coat of black paint and restored its identity with HMRS pressfix transfers.

For less than ten hours' work, spread over a week, this I feel is a very credible result.