I'm one or two clicks away from picking up one of these suckers on BLW's website ($137 a pop). http://www.blwnscale.com/on%20till%20its%20gone.htm Then I caught myself and said "Hey stupid, why not ask some knowledgeable folks and see if its worth it or if you're going to have an expensive dust collector?" I did some searching around today while at work, and only found a couple of reviews on them (they were rated high). Has anyone else picked one of these up and tried them out? Comments? Should I stay away? Able to shoehorn some DCC lovin' into them?
I just read the review in MR for it, and they said it runs excellent, but it doesn't pull hardly anything. I found that pretty sad for and expensive model like this.
Since I don't own one, I can't comment. If you click on the word "search" near the top and enter the word "Berkshire" in the box, you will find several threads on this locomotive. Frank
I have seen a lot of talk about them here. They run great. They look great. They pull bad only 12-17 cars or so and not on any hill. And if you want to put DCC into them you better be a expert in steam loco maintenance as you have to take it all apart and do some fancy stuff to get to the motor for the power leads. I have put DCC in most any and all steam out there but have not done the berk yet. I did not think it would get much use on my layout. With all that work and not use it mine will be shelf fodder for a while.
Ditto the above: looks nice runs very nicely will not pull Mine also lost its eccentric rod during break-in. As I had modified it, my F not-so-LHS would not exchange it. They were not wrong in that. LL would not exchange it either, but did offer to repair it. They did caution that the parts were not available and that it was likely to be sitting a LL for some time. Not wanting to have it sit and be forgotten, I declined their offer. LL was not wrong, but I still think that they could have done better. I have attempted several repairs, most of which have failed, but the latest seems to be working. The modification that I made was to correct the height of the front coupler. The statement in the MR review that the couplers are the correct height is erroneous--the front couplers are all too high. Unfortunately, I had made this modification before the eccentric flew off. I did have some contact problems during break-in. The tender has only the rear truck live. It would benefit from having both trucks live. I would have paid the difference. When I weighted the tender to attempt to correct this problem, the pulling power went way down. I took out the weight, continued the run-in. Further break-in seems to have addressed the problem. This locomotive is an expensive disappointment. I bought one; I will not buy any more.
Looks like I can't spell too well when I did a search, came up empty. I'm glad I didn't hit that checkout button and follow through now, with some of the disappointments I've read here, and from talking to some members of the local mrr club. thanks for all of your comments about this!
Todd: I think the LL 2-8-4 Berkshire is a fine loco. It is very delicately detailed. As far as running goes, the loco does exceptionally well at very slow speeds. I have 6 LL 2-8-4's and they all pull about 22 cars on a level surface. The pulling performance will improve dramatically with increased break-in and running time. This loco is light at the front end and I added some weight in the front pilot area. I also added weight in the tender area between the trucks. You have to be very careful in handling this steamer, as the added detailed parts tend to be fragile. All in all, the LL 2-8-4 is a fine running loco. MR suggest that the loco only pulls 12 cars on a flat surface. I'm pretty sure that they didn't run the loco 20+ hours for a break-in period. Stay cool and run steam.....
Hello Todd, I don't own one either but from the reports of modelers that do, and MR's review pretty much sum up the performance of LL's New Berk. I would add that adding weight you might want to be very careful in this regard. Looking at the stall current, (which is close to the slip current) the motor appears to be right on the edge of its performance envelope, or in laymans terms, adding too much weight might make it run too warm, thus melting shells and the like. If your into straight dc current it would be good buy, but dcc users will be taxed trying to get this puppy converted, a total tear down and put it back together isn't my idea of fun. Rob
Rob: I had no trouble converting the 6 Berks' I have to DCC. It just took some time and patience. I used a Lenz 1025 JST decoder with a harness for all the Berks. The decoder is placed in the tender and the harness separates the wirng from the loco to the tender. This is the same decoder installation I used for my Kato Mikado's. Stay cool and run steam......
Early release Berks had problems with drive components coming loose or the loco freezing-up due to gear problems. Also the siderods caused some problems I had one that ran barely an hour before the gear drive broke. No visible damage but the drive was frozen solid. returned it and did not replace it. Newer releases may have some of these bugs fixed.
Early release Berks had problems with drive components coming loose or the loco freezing-up due to gear problems. Also the siderods caused some problems I had one that ran barely an hour before the gear drive broke. No visible damage but the drive was frozen solid. returned it and did not replace it. Newer releases may have some of these bugs fixed.
Bruce: All of my Berks' were from the early release. All are operating without problems. Stay cool and run steam.......
Powersteamguy---I see that you have six LL Berks. I was wondering, are they all the same railroad? Or are they undecs, where you gave each loco an individual identity? Or different roads? I only ask this because I've often bought multiples myself. In my case, for example, the Kato Mikado: I have eight of them, one CN, because I like Canada a lot; one GN, because early on, I got a ConCor GN 4-8-4; 2 NYC, because the NYC ran through the city where I have lived the last 30+ years; 1 DL&W (BLW special run) because I have also developed an interest in that road; finally, 4 undecs, three of which I lettered (it was the 1st run) for the Erie, a railroad which I watched as a kid, and which has always been my main modeling interest. The eighth mike, believe it or not, is a "spare," in case one of the others breaks down! I suppose I'm partly a "collector," but I really do cherish all of my engines. I could provide similar explanations for my ownership of other steamers, e.g., my eight Spectrum 2-8-0s, or my two 4-8-2s. What, if you don't mind sharing it, is your plan for the six Berks? Mind you, this is just a friendly question, as I am myself very much an N scale aficcionado. P.S.---I realize that the thread is mostly about LL 2-8-4 "quality," and I apologize for being somewhat off topic. [ April 22, 2005, 11:21 PM: Message edited by: Jay Gould ]
Jay: I have two undec's that I'm going to renumber for ATSF, two Nickel Plate ; one Per Marguette and one C&O. I would have preferred Southern, ATSF or SP but those roads weren't available as this was an eastern roadname run of 2-8-4's. Six undec's weren't available to me at the time of purchase. I made three purchases of 2-8-4's with three different vendors. The undec's were purchased at $125/loco when Chuck at Feather River had a sale. Stay cool and run steam.....
I'll back Bob on this one. My 2 Berks run flawlessly. They aren't the greatest pullers in my roster, but 15 to 20 box cars is ok by me.
I've done some of the lengthy break-in that PSG recommends. They do pull better, but 15-20 cars on level track is about it. They do double-head quite well on my test track, though that's not the Berk was for. I don't have time to pull them apart for DCC right now.
Pete: If and when you decide to put decodersin the LL 2-8-4, use the Lenz 1025 JST with a harness. That way, if you have trouble with a decoder, the solution is easy. Unplug it and remove the decoder from the tender. Stay cool and run steam.....
