Pete Waterman's trains make £600,000 to help trust

The Midlands-born Walsall fan sold the miniature trains to fund apprenticeships at the heritage trust he runs and secure enough money to restore a collection of full-size steam engines.

Two Gauge 1 steam models sold for £124,000 each, while another went for £86,800.

He said the engines had realised what he wanted and he had raised 'not far off' the amount he hoped.

His model trains, built from scratch for him, went on sale in London's Mayfair. The 68-year-old record producer, a member of the former Stock Aitken Waterman hit-making machine, is the world's leading collector and patron of model trains but has decided to auction off his 50-strong collection.

The money will go to the Waterman Railway Heritage Trust, which holds his collection of full-size steam engines, housed at sites around the country.

At the auction, a seven-and-a-quarter-inch gauge Great Western railway Beyer Goods, which Waterman described as 'the greatest steam railway engine built in miniature', was one of the models to fetch £120,000.

The other was Caerphilly Castle, both going to the same telephone bidder. The sale of 32 of the models fetched a total of £627,229, including buyers' premium.

The remaining 24 models failed to reach their reserve price and were not sold but post-sale offers are continuing to come in, the auctioneers said.

Waterman said the engines were 'the Fabergé eggs of the railway world'.

He said he had decided to sell what amounts to around a tenth of his collection in order to raise enough money to secure the future of the Waterman Railway Heritage Trust, which holds his collection of full-size steam engines.

He said the pieces he was selling no longer fitted 'into his wider collection'.

"I never run that stuff any more," he said. "Everything I'm selling is unique. It was all built for me.

They are one-offs. They are not toys."