Brass - Worth It Or Not?

[kbkchooch]

I depends, what are you looking for? Want a model you can display, with ridiculous detail? Spend $1400 bucks like a buddy of mine did for a C&O Allegheny.
Want a road specific type of smaller engine? It may be your only choice.
If you are the tinkering type, by all means! There is a lot of so-so performing early brass that can be had relatively cheaply (Akane, PFM, Etc) that become serious performers with a remotoring, maybe a gearbox, good paint and sound. I've got a few brass pieces that started their lives with me that way, and run great and look great now.
There are others that I would recommend right out of the box as good runners, and wont break the bank. My 1st brass loco was a Sunset Pennsy H9 Consolidation. Great runner and in 1990 dollars was $275.00.
One thing I would recommend. Shop around and do your homework before buying. Check out a brown book. No sense buying an engine you can't live with.
And DON"T buy brass as an investment. Your money was safer with Bernie Madoff.

 

[montanan]

My opinion, "No" especially the diesels. The detail on modern plastic units is amazing. Brass has never run as well as the plastic since Atlas introduced the Kato drive in 1984 or so. In fact I sold almost my entire brass collection in the 1990s to get the "better" plastic ones. For detail I'll take a Genesis, Tower-55, InterMountain, or even the new Proto-2000 over brass. For well running I'll take a Stewart, Atlas, or Kato over brass.

If you want a brass showpiece, get a steam locomotive that is not made in a plastic or die-cast version. Like the D&RGW 3 cylinder 4-8-2.

I have had excellent experience with the brass steam locomotives I have. All are fantastic running locomotives. Excellent slow speed running, smooth and capable pulling locomotives. I had my Z-5 Yellowstone operating at a model railroad club pulling over 100 cars and still drawing bearly .2 amps, bearly warm. Wish i had more locomotives that ran that well. I will admit that there have been serious issues with the running qualities of some brass locomotives (I have remotored a few for people) but some are excellent running. It's a shame that you can't take them for a test drive befor you buy them.

 

[Midnught Special]

Well on that note real trains aren't made out of plastic either LOL.

tre but the plastic is durable and easy to paint, plus I run my trains, so brass would be pointless to me anyways as im not a collector, im a modler...lol

 

[kbkchooch]

tre but the plastic is durable and easy to paint, plus I run my trains, so brass would be pointless to me anyways as im not a collector, im a modler...lol

Having worked with several different brands of paint , I find brass can be more forgiving than plastic to paint, easier to strip and repaint, (lacquer thinner) plus you can bake a finish on brass. Try that with plastic!

 

[montanan]

Having worked with several different brands of paint , I find brass can be more forgiving than plastic to paint, easier to strip and repaint, (lacquer thinner) plus you can bake a finish on brass. Try that with plastic!

I will agree with you about brass being more forgiving. Once the primer has been applied, the most important thing is tha the paint is applied in light coats (I use and air brush). It may take 3, 4 or even 5 coats, but by taking your time you won't over load the mosel with paint covering up or hiding fine details. I find that it is a lot easier to cover up details on plastic locomotives than brass.

 

[Espeefan]

I have bought brass when plastic isn't available. For a guy who models steam era SP, that's most of the time, at least for locomotives! My Westsides and Sunsets are good runners, and do just fine on DCC after remotoring. Japanese PFM's are cadillacs and with the exception of some their articulated steamers, are quite and smooth runners. Articulated steamers may run well but be noisy. I have one or two that will wake the dead! They will pull well if properly weighted too. One sticking point is that they must typically be tuned to each layout they run on. For most brass models, tolerances are tighter than those on plastic models. I don't know that I would spend the money on brass diesels. Steamers are another story! Beware of anything early Korean (late 1970's or 1980's before they learned how to solder). I have had early Korean models shed parts at an alarming rate. Do your research before buying.

 

[montanan]

I have bought brass when plastic isn't available. For a guy who models steam era SP, that's most of the time, at least for locomotives! My Westsides and Sunsets are good runners, and do just fine on DCC after remotoring. Japanese PFM's are cadillacs and with the exception of some their articulated steamers, are quite and smooth runners. Articulated steamers may run well but be noisy. I have one or two that will wake the dead! They will pull well if properly weighted too. One sticking point is that they must typically be tuned to each layout they run on. For most brass models, tolerances are tighter than those on plastic models. I don't know that I would spend the money on brass diesels. Steamers are another story! Beware of anything early Korean (late 1970's or 1980's before they learned how to solder). I have had early Korean models shed parts at an alarming rate. Do your research before buying.

I will definitely agree with you about the PFM's being Cadillacs. My Z-5 Yellowstone is a PFM and still one of the smoothest running locomotives I have seen and quiet, especially being articulated. Due to the price of brass, I was shying away from them even with my good experience with the Z-5. One of the Consolidations I picked up, the Santa Fe I custom painted for the Logan Valley 184, andther PFM is another exceptionally fine running locomotive. Modeling the SP can be quite a challenge if you're modeling the steam era as they has so many different locomotives. The only way I could get accurate Northern Pacific steamers is in bress. It's hard to find anything in NP except for a few diesels that have ecome available in recent years.

 

[Iron Horseman]

One is a Northern Pacific Z-5 Yellowstone, 2-8-8-2 locomotive.

I presume you mean a 2-8-8-4? Then I say Really? Because that is one locomotive that I kept during the great brass purge of the mid 1980s. I picked it up for a song at the time. Mine had already been repowered and fine tuned, the only thing it isn't is painted. It is still in its gory brass color. I'm afraid taking it apart enough to paint it properly will ruin its tune.

 

[montanan]

I presume you mean a 2-8-8-4? Then I say Really? Because that is one locomotive that I kept during the great brass purge of the mid 1980s. I picked it up for a song at the time. Mine had already been repowered and fine tuned, the only thing it isn't is painted. It is still in its gory brass color. I'm afraid taking it apart enough to paint it properly will ruin its tune.

You are correct on the 2-8-8-4. Sorry, I had my shoes on. I never even had to remotor the locomotive. I had put a PFM sound system in it. It was nice because they had cams on the axles which made installation easy. Later when I stopped using PFM sound and converted it to DCC, the original motor is still performing great. I'll tell you that it was one heck of a job painting that locomotive. I had parts everywhere. No digital cameras back then, but I did take a number of Poloroid shots and got everything back together and working fine on the first try.