To what extent are capital investments sunk costs? This question is addressed by examining the salvage values of discarded metalworking machinery. Even though such assets are expected to be non-specific, many discarded assets are scrapped rather than sold on second-hand markets. Econometric results suggest that firms can only expect to get back 20–50 percent of the initial price of a ‘new’ machine once it is installed. The results also indicate differences in value-age profiles across firms, but provide only weak support for the hypothesis that salvage values are particularly low during recessions.