Buyer Beware

With so many redundant locos currently available for sale in the UK it is inevitable that some people with half an idea of preservation and no previous experience will take an interest in restoring a few of them.
To my mind there are few pitfalls for the unwary:
1) Before you bid, make sure you have;
a) Sorted out a railway that will be happy to host you while you restore the loco to working order.
b) factored in the cost of the transport to your chosen place of restoration.
c) a ready supply of spare parts (talk to Booths and other railway scrap merchants about component recovery).
2) Once there, you will need to get together with a group of like minded enthusiasts to help with the work. Doing it alone can be very slow work, unless you have very deep pockets to pay for professional help.
See recent banter on the Preserved Diesels Forum for more details….
One of the suggestions was that those in the know should write a guide to diesel preservation:



Matt Stoddon was kind enough to mock up the title page…….