I bought this Hornby 'Battle of Britain' loco, "Spitfire" a few months ago as a cheap 'non-runner' from a seller on Ebay who didn't know much about the internals of model loco's. I took me about 10 minutes to get it running again, although someone had decided that the motor might run better in an 'oil bath'!!! To any motor, small or otherwise, bathed in oil is the kiss of death, so it was duly cleaned up, commutator polished up, brushes de-oiled, then a good run, before being DCC converted. As it's not one of the later versions of Hornby B-o-B's, it's the old faithful X04 motor, which, while not quite as smooth as the current can type motors, nevertheless in good fettle, they can be a decent runner, and this one proved to be, so I decided that it was worth a cosmetic upgrade, as I model the later BR Southern Region era, rather than the earlier Southern Railway era. This model had 3 raised ribs the length of the loco body, whereas the later versions had smooth sides, so with some gentle scraping with a sharp blade, the ribs disappeared, then the body was rubbed down and primer sprayed. As usual, this showed up some dings and nibs, so more filling/sanding and a further coat of primer left the loco body ready for a finish coat. This was the easy bit, as I decided to alter the tender to the later version, so a fair bit of 'cut n' shut' took place to remodel the later version, taking the opportunity to get rid of the moulded-on ladders on the tender rear before primer spraying. This was what I started with below.
The high side raves were cut off and 'Plasticard' used to fabricate the amended bodywork, substituting the imitation with real coal, adding the metal panel over the air reservoirs, tender water filler and new brass fret tender ladders. After primering was completed, finish coats were sprayed on, and I decided to change the loco's identity to 34067, "Tangmere", purely because I was lucky enough several years ago, to book onto a "Statesman Rail" day trip to Canterbury, pulled by this loco. Decals, nameplates/shields and smokebox numberplate from "Fox Transfers", smokebox door 'darts' and a couple of coats of satin varnish to seal it all, plus cab window glazing and some soldered and painted copper wire for pipes rounded it off, and updated a rather elderly but sound loco to something approaching the current Hornby equivalent, maybe not "Super Detail", but a big saving on the current Hornby offering, and a lot of enjoyment in doing it! Keith.
