If you really want to talk about Ship of Theseus-ing a Thinkpad, the hardcore guys have literally ripped out the motherboard and installed a completely different motherboard with a modern i7 CPU. These "frankenpads" include the X62 (Broadwell CPU and motherboard in an old X61), T70 (Kaby Lake CPU in a T60), X210 (Kaby Lake R CPU in a X200 body). They also rip out the LCD and replace it with a modern IPS display. They sometimes also rip out the keyboard to replace it with an older keyboard- T420 keyboard in a T430 is common.