Peter.
You will have to be lucky to get any mk1 or mk2 in the UK that said they do turn up..... problem is getting folk to let go of them, and to do this it can get expensive. I imported a 1942 Canadian Mk1 Universal Carrier from Ontario but this was after a years search and an aweful lot of let downs........ things you need to consider are:
A) your budget
B) your access to toolage
C) your skill level for prefab etc
my carrier was very cheap but there was not much left of it..
If you Contact John at
www.midwestmil.com and let him know you are looking for a carrier to restore, i am sure he will keep his ear to the ground for you.
last unit he sold was a beautiful mk1 3"mortar carrier which was circa 9K (then add about 3K to get her back to UK soil)
another contact is Dirk Leegwater at
www.lwdparts.com he recently sold a mk1 tub and last year had a very complete mk2 unit which was 15.000 euro (obviously you would offset the shipping against bringing one back from Canada or Australia.
if you have to have British then Australia is your best bet as most of the Pattern carriers seem to end up there (plus they have also got LP carriers too)
carrier owners here in the UK and on this forum include
Kevin Powles
Martyn Tasker
Barry
Nick
Shaun Hindle
Nigel Watson (Author of the carrier books vol 1, 2 and soon to be 3)
Ron
and me.
pretty much a carrier platoon now
there will be others so sorry if i have missed them.
my point being get in touch with all of these people who can advise and share their experience with purchasing carriers and owning them.
sorry for the torrent of info but i can spend hours on the subject of looking and buying hahahaha.
cheers
Richie