When Jim McDonough isn't out at sea fishing, he likes to build boats - out of Lego. And he likes to build big.

The 51-year-old from near Arbroath on the Scottish east coast spent three years building a 1:40 scale replica of the 270m USS Missouri.

That means his version of the ship, on which the Japanese surrendered to end World War II, is around 7m long.

Its length means it sticks out of his garage but it is just one of many Lego creations by McDonough - others include a 4.3m Japanese destroyer and a 3m Japanese military transport. He's also built a Star Wars X-wing fighter.

McDonough had thought his version of the Missouri would be the largest Lego-built ship in the world, but American Dan Siskind has pipped him with a 7.8m version of the ship.

McDonough doesn't intend trying to gain the record with his next project, a model of the USS Saratoga, as his models were all built to the same scale.

And importantly for McDonough, they are built without glue.

"I don't use glue and everything can be taken apart," The Scotsman quoted him saying.

"If you go to Legoland it's all glued together, which to me is cheating because anyone can glue stuff together."