Project Steam chairman John Sutherland said the Dunedin-based group was working to restore a P class steam locomotive by using the salvaged parts of four locomotives rescued for preservation.

The salvaged locomotives were among those the New Zealand Railways Department bought from British company Nasmyth, Wilson and Co in the 1880s and deployed to Otago.

Mr Sutherland, of Dunedin, said the locomotives were salvaged from locomotive dump sites in Otago and Southland as incomplete hulks.