Britannia AuctionsMachinery and engineering auctions in Manchester
Manchester's machine shops are on the ring road, not in the middle. Trafford Park has the biggest concentration, with engineering firms alongside packaging, food, drink and chemicals plants that all keep their own maintenance workshops. Sharston, Openshaw, Newton Heath and Agecroft in Salford have older units where general engineering still goes on.
A machinery auction here goes in front of two kinds of buyer. The engineering trade in Stockport, Bolton, Oldham and Rochdale is a short trip from the viewing day, and dealers and end users bid online from anywhere in the UK.
We catalogue on site, publish full specifications, run the sale for a week or two and manage collection on fixed days. Whether it is one CNC lathe or a whole shop, tell us what you have through the contact form.
Maintenance workshops inside bigger plants
A lot of the machine tools sold around here do not come from engineering firms at all. Food, chemicals and packaging plants at Trafford Park and along the M62 keep a maintenance workshop with a lathe, a mill, a pillar drill and a welding bay, and when the plant closes or moves that workshop is sold with everything else.
Those machines have often done light work and are in good order for their age. A manual lathe that has spent twenty years making the odd replacement shaft may carry less wear than one that ran three shifts, and wear is among the first things a buyer checks. We catalogue the workshop as its own group of lots within the wider site sale, with the same detail we would give a machine shop.
If the site is a large one, the machine tools go in the same catalogue as the production line, the forklifts, the racking and the office kit, so buyers see the whole thing on one viewing day.
Collection off the M60 and from the older east side
Trafford Park was built for lorries, with junctions 9 to 11 of the M60 minutes away. We still check each unit for the door height, the yard and the loading point, and where the site allows it a single collection window can run with several movers on site at once.
Openshaw and Newton Heath are older. Some units sit on terraced streets with a shutter onto the road and no yard. What a machining centre needs coming out of one of those depends on its weight, its dimensions and the route, and it may mean a smaller rigid lorry, a Hiab or a parking suspension. We look at the route on the first visit and write the access into the catalogue so buyers price the job properly.
Buyers book and pay for the removal of their lots. We agree the window and the order with you, attend, and release lots against paid invoices.
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 Manchester
- Our shop is in Trafford Park and the landlord wants it back at the quarter day. How tight is that?
Quarter days come round quickly. A machinery sale normally fits inside two months if we start straight away, though the plan depends on how many lots there are and the access. We catalogue in the first week and run the bidding for a week or two, with collection after it closes, which usually leaves time to make good before the keys go back. If the date is closer than that, we can move the machines to our own premises and sell them from there, which takes the deadline out of the equation.
- We have one CNC machining centre and a few manual machines. Is it worth an auction?
Yes, though the route may be different for each. A late model machining centre with a common control system can do well by private treaty to a dealer, and we will suggest that if the machine warrants it. The manual machines and the tooling go to auction, where they suit smaller shops around Greater Manchester and beyond. Either way one person handles it from the first call to settlement, and there is no minimum size of job.
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.