How thick is your bodyshell ?

On the top of the Class 26 body there was a fair representation of the fan grille which could easily have been left alone, but after a bit of soul searching I decided it needed to go and be replaced with an etched replacement to keep the model consistent all over. Etched sides and a solid top would have seemed, odd. That and I found that a 4mm scale grille from a Class 17 would fit exactly on my 3mm scale loco...

First up I drilled a load of holes in the moulding. Then I tried to join them up by waggling a knife blade in these to join them up. This didn't seem to work so I dug out the piercing saw and used this.

One removed, the plug of waste turned out to be 4.5mm thick !

A quick clean up with a file and then the big tapered reamer sorted the inside. I pared away the top detail with a sharp knife. Finally the etched part was stuck in place. It looks a lit better and even comes with a little fan that I might paint up and fit at a later date.