It could be made better if you could find a pair of tender trucks from the later releases and hard-solder leads from their pickup plates to your motor, or better, find a whole tender from a later release so you have their excellent tender floor system with the bronze strips. But those are rare by themselves. I'm afraid you will be better off looking for a whole 1980s-era Kato-built engine. Seek the ones that have tender pickups and the gray plastic siderods. Those were the best. When Kato and Con-Cor parted ways, and Con-Cor continued making the Hudson on their own, they were never as good.
The 1980s ones still hold up to today's running quality, even though the boiler details are crude by modern standards.
