THEIR work often takes place inside a warehouse away from the eyes of the public.

But it is there where craftsmen at Stanegate Restorations and Replicas are working tirelessly to restore vintage vehicles and objects that date back to the 19th century.

The Haltwhistle-based conservation and repair company's work has seen them commissioned for hundreds of projects to repair and restore vintage trains, cabins and wagons.

“It is quite amazing just what Stanegate’s craftsmen can recreate from virtually nothing,” its owner David Charlton said.

Restoring rolling stock over 100 years old is a specialised activity that few businesses will undertake, but when an 1898 railway carriage recently appeared in the Stanegate workshops from Wales, staff were eager to show their expertise.

The Welsh connection goes back to the early days of the company. In 2006, some staff from the Ffestiniog Railway, who had relocated to the North-East, were asked to rebuild a derelict carriage for yet another Welsh Narrow Gauge line, in this case the Welsh Highland Heritage Railway. That contract was followed by a second carriage for the same line, and the word spread through the Heritage sector with a steady flow of projects since then.

Stanegate staff certainly do not get bored as the range of restored items leaving the workshops is incredibly extensive.

A rowing lifeboat was followed by some horse drawn vehicles; several coal wagons have been rebuilt using just the original ironwork.

A cab for a steam powered waggon, cabins for Saltburn Cliff Lift, a 'carriage' for Scottish convicts and a horse-drawn coke-fired fish and chip van provided further variety.

David added: “The rewards on seeing a project presented to the public are immense and sometimes highly unusual.”

Stanegate and its projects are no strangers to National TV and media, BBC presenter John Craven used the service for a section of Heritage Heroes, the Saltburn Cliff Lift work featured in another film and the restored rowing lifeboat has featured several times in Coast, Lloyds Bank adverts and filming of several documentaries.

All of this is brought together by Stanegate’s largest project, one that is still ongoing. Anyone watching “The Railways that built Britain” will see Chris Tarrant doing a lot of his talk to camera from a Victorian third-class carriage.

This is part of an ongoing project to recreate a late nineteenth century North Staffordshire Railway commuter train for the Knotty Coach Trust.

Although Stanegate’s main projects travel across Europe, the team will use continually use their skills to create domestic items.