A 130-TONNE steam locomotive at Didcot Railway Centre will get some tender loving care after a £2,500 windfall.

Publisher Haynes Publishing handed over the cash after releasing a book about the Castle series of locomotives.

The money will go towards the restoration of the world-famous locomotive 4079 Pendennis Castle.

Secondary school teacher Drew Fermor, who is project manager for the restoration, wrote the Haynes Owner’s Workshop Manual for the GWR/BR (WR) Castle class, and was presented with the cheque at his book’s launch.

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He said: “My long-suffering and very supporting partner affectionately refers to Pendennis Castle as ‘the other woman’.”

Pendennis Castle was built in Swindon in the mid-1920s and trialled against locomotives on the London Northeastern Railway, including the Flying Scotsman.

Mr Fermor said it “wiped the floor with them. In her day she was a very efficient locomotive.”

It was kept in the UK until 1977 when then-owner Sir William McApline sold it to Hamersley Iron, part of the multinational Rio Tinto group, in Australia.

Mr Fermor said: “She was that engine that we would never get back.

“She was in Australia until 1994 and then couldn’t run anymore.

She desperately needed overhaul.

“In 2000 she was offered to the Great Western Society for free, on two conditions. Firstly she had to be restored to use.

“And secondly, from the minute she went out of the station in Australia, she was our problem.”

One round-the-world ferry trip and £50,000 transport costs later, the locomotive arrived at Didcot Railway Centre.

As part of the ongoing restoration work, all components are being tested to Network Rail standards in the hope that Pendennis Castle will be able to pull trains again.

The cheque presented to Mr Fermor represents the photograph budget for the book.

Photographers whose work was used in the book all agreed to donate their reproduction fees to the locomotive’s fund.

A lot of images came from Great Western Trust’s Frank Dumbleton, Sir William McAlpine and photographers from Australia.

Mr Dumbleton said: “It’s the locomotive that I have known for over 50 years.

“It’s very much a celebrity because of its exploits when it was new. We rather love Pendennis Castle.”

Aided by the new funds, fortnightly work on Pendennis Castle continues and is set to finish in the next few years.

It is hoped that Pendennis Castle will be united with the Flying Scotsman in Didcot as both approach their 100th birthday.