Britannia AuctionsMachinery and engineering auctions in Doncaster
Big machines are the norm in a Doncaster sale. The rail workshops that maintain locomotives and rolling stock run wheel lathes, horizontal borers, radial drills and presses on a scale that most towns never see, and the steel fabricators on Kirk Sandall and Wheatley Hall Road are not far behind. Add the plant hire yards and the agricultural machinery dealers on the edge of the borough, each with a fitting shop and a set of welding bays, and the lots run from a pillar drill to something that needs a road closure to move.
We sell all of that in one catalogue. The rail and heavy lots are advertised to the small number of buyers who can use them, and the general workshop plant goes to the wider trade, with Rotherham, Barnsley, Sheffield and Worksop close enough to walk the lots on the viewing day.
Tell us what you have, with sizes and weights if you know them, through the contact form.
Wheel lathes and borers with a short buyer list
Rail workshop plant has a narrow market rather than a broad one. A wheel lathe or an axle press suits other rail maintenance depots and the contractors and dealers who overhaul or export rolling stock. Outside that circle there is little use for it, and scrap value is the floor under the price.
That changes how we sell it. The catalogue for a rail lot is written with the rail trade in mind, with the gauge, the capacity, the control and the last overhaul date listed, and the sale is advertised to those buyers directly rather than left to be found. Where the machine is very large we allow a longer bidding period so that a buyer at a distance has time to arrange a survey.
The fabrication and machine shop lots in the same sale, the lathes, mills, saws and welding sets, are ordinary trade stock and sell in the usual way.
Retirement sales and the older estates near the centre
Many of the fabrication shops on Wheatley Hall Road and Balby Carr are owner run. If you are retiring and selling the equipment rather than transferring the business, the timetable is usually yours to set, with no administrator and no lease date pressing on it.
That time is worth using. The catalogue can be built over a couple of visits, and machines that can safely be run stay connected for the viewing day so your staff can demonstrate them where you agree to that. Anything you want to keep or sell privately is settled before the list is published, and any history you hold on a machine goes in the catalogue, because buyers price what they can check.
The older estates near the centre suit rigid lorries and low loaders rather than the largest articulated trailers, so we check what can stand at the door before the heavy lots are planned. The newer parks by the M18 are checked the same way.
What these sales can include
- CNC turning centres
- CNC vertical and horizontal machining centres
- Manual and toolroom lathes
- Milling machines
- Surface and cylindrical grinders
- Press brakes and guillotines
- Laser, plasma and waterjet cutters
- Bandsaws and cold saws
- Radial arm and pillar drills
- Welding sets and positioners
- Coordinate measuring machines
- Tooling, chucks and workholding
- Compressors and dust extraction
- Cranes, hoists and forklifts
Viewing, bidding and the buyer's premium
Machinery sales run as online timed auctions. The catalogue is published with photographs and specifications. Buyers register, view the machines on the viewing day, and bid online until the lots close. The sale is advertised to the engineering trade, and bidding is online and open to buyers across the UK and beyond.
The buyer pays the hammer price plus the buyer's premium. VAT is charged where it applies and shown separately on the buyer's invoice. Ask and we will go through the specifics for your sale. Where a buyer is overseas, they arrange their own export.
Machines are offered as seen under the auction terms, and buyers are expected to inspect before bidding, which is why the viewing day matters. Machines that can be run safely stay connected for the viewing day so your staff can demonstrate them where that is agreed, and everything else is isolated and left safe.
The machinery and engineering auctions page covers what the buyers want to know, what affects demand, reserves and estimates, removal and access, when a private sale beats an auction.
Questions about selling in Doncaster
- I am closing my fabrication shop when I retire. How long from first call to the money?
Eight to ten weeks is a reasonable plan, though it turns on the number of lots, the access and how quickly buyers collect. The first visit and the catalogue take two or three weeks. Bidding then runs for a week or two with a viewing day inside it, and collection follows on days we agree. Buyers pay us before they collect. You are paid after the sale is reconciled, once buyers have paid and the collection window has closed, from cleared funds and with a lot by lot statement.
- One of our borers weighs forty tonnes and sits on a foundation. Does that put buyers off?
It narrows the market. Removing a forty tonne machine depends on its weight, its dimensions and the route out, and it is a specialist job the buyer arranges and pays for. We help by putting the weight, the footprint, the foundation detail and the yard access in the catalogue with photographs, so a mover's quote can be obtained before the sale closes. Cutting the foundation bolts is part of the buyer's removal. Filling the pit afterwards normally falls to you under the lease.
More questions about machinery auctions
Related services
Guides
- How a commercial asset auction works
A stage by stage account of an online timed auction for business assets. It covers the asset schedule, cataloguing, viewing days, how bidding closes, buyer's premium and VAT, collection and how you get paid.
- Preparing machinery and equipment for sale
What to do before viewing day. Keep the machines that can be run safely available to demonstrate, isolate the rest, clean but do not repaint, find the tooling and manuals, and sort out access for removal.
- How used machinery is valued
Buyers pay for what a machine will do for them, less what it costs to get it out and running. This guide explains how make, hours, tooling, demand and removal cost feed a guide price, and why that price is not book value.