Another one sorted!

With the mechanicals finished it was time to put the Lima Prairie tank back together. However, before reattaching the body to the chassis, the opportunity was taken to give the body a bit of a clean.

In fact it had a bath! Using a brush and a popular brand of washing-up liquid, the fairies managed to remove most of the dirt!

Looking better after being dried off with Mrs. Woody's hair drier!

I had missed one thing though. That was, that there was another ballast weight in the coal bunker which had been hidden by the footplate. Looking at it revealed that the dreaded zinc rot had been busy. In fact, left much longer it is likely that the plastic body may well have split as the weight expanded being held in place on those two plastic lugs.

There was nothing else to do but remove it and that took some doing as it was well edged in place!

With it out, it was clear that this was beyond saving. The structural integrity has gone past the point of being safe so I have left it out of the loco.

With the body and pony trucks reattached the loco went back on the tracks for a final testing and it still ran well! Another one sorted!