house, spent a fortnight making various repairs, and drove it to his mother's house in Bolton. After he had married and bought his own property on Radcliffe New Road, he cut an access road to the garden of his new house and moved the steamroller there. Restoring the engine took many years, as Dibnah had to create his own replacement parts, using Victorian engineering techniques and equipment he built in his garden. The boiler was in poor condition and needed serious work, but Dibnah fell back on local knowledge and was eventually able to build a new boiler. Once it was restored, he used the 1910 Aveling and Porter steamroller together with a living van he bought and restored, to take his family around the local steam fairs. While driving the vehicle was relatively safe, Dibnah had experienced several mishaps, including one instance when he lost control while descending a steep hill and was forced to drive the engine into a concrete barrier to bring it to a halt, smashing the front fork in the process. Restoring the steamroller placed a heavy burden upon his marriage and Alison would often complain that her husband spent more time in the shed, repairing the engine, than he did in the house. He responded by naming the vehicle Alison, telling his wife "It's not every woman that has a steam engine named after her." Alison eventually developed an affection for the antique vehicle, saying, "We've done without for so many years to get it built up. I couldn't bear to part with it. There's too much of us in it." His next purchase, made in the autumn of 1980, was a 1912 Aveling & Porter traction engine. Dibnah paid a friend £2,300 for the vehicle and moved it to the garden behind his home. He built a steam-driven workshop in his garden, salvaging parts from various mills, including line shaft gear and a stationary engine from a mill in Oldham. He gave a conservative estimate of four years to complete the work, but the restoration eventually took 27 years. The engine was sold at auction in July 2010 for £240,000. In 1988 he was asked by Caernarfon Council to make repairs to a chimney at Parc Glynllifon. Beneath the chimney, an engine room contained an 1854 single-cylinder steam engine in poor condition. Dibnah repaired the chimney and several weeks later was asked to