Editing NIR 1 Class (section)

==Withdrawal from service and initial preservation==
All three were put into store during the late 1980s, the first in 1986 and the last two in May 1989. The Irish Traction group had approached NIR in August 1989 hoping to run a farewell excursion with No. 2 in September 1989, but this plan failed after No. 2 suffered a catastrophic engine failure on Saturday 9 September 1989 (the day before the excursion),<ref name="ITG1" /> despite having been overhauled by NIR at York Road Works. Both Nos. 2 and 3 ended up in secure storage at Larne Harbour, where the Diesel engines, [[torque converter]]s and final drives were removed in 1991.

It was originally intended to put the locomotives on display at Lisburn, Belfast Central, and Londonderry to celebrate the 150th anniversary of railways in Northern Ireland, and in mid-1989, locomotive No. 1 had its engine, torque converter and final drive removed at York Road works before being repainted in NIR red and moved to the Lisburn Engineer's yard; unfortunately, difficulties in placing the engine meant it was shunted to the back of the yard.