Hi All,
I asked this question in a different forum, and was told i might get more feed back here… So
As someone who now has 3 N&W Steam locos:
1= Proto 2K 2-8-8-2 Y3
2= BLI 2-6-6-4 Class A… Sound
3= PCM 2-8-8-2 Y6… Sound
And loving them…
I would like to ask the questions…
What is your favorite Steam Loco in your collection?
What Road do you like most?
And why to both??
Always Training… Matt
I just got a BLI J type N & W 4-8-4 and it is my favorite right now. It runs very well on my smaller setup.
My favorite steam loco has to be my old Big Boy. I could watch it run around the layout for hours. The thing is just so huge, bigger then anything else I have. Eventually I plan on buying a couple more with sound.
No doubt the NKP Berkshires. They are big enough to look massive without overwhelming the layout plus they have such classic lines for a steam locomotive. I think they were the pinnacle of medium-size steam power.
Yes i have one of these two… i just love the way it looks as well… best ever non Articulated locos…
Keep up the training…Matt
I have three or four steam locos, BLI and P2K in the mix… but my favorite is a Bachmann Spectrum consoladated. It’s also the least expensive.
JaRRell
Yeah P2k Make an outstanding unit… the first two steam locos i picked up from the us were both P2k’s The first was just a little 0-8-0 shunter. Thanks just got bigger and better from there…lol
Enjoy… Matt
My favorites are my 2-6-6-6 C&O Allegheny , C&O T-1 2-10-4 by BLI and a Walthers C&O 2-8-4 Berkshire. I like all steam locomotives but these seem to have such a balanced classical look to them.
Jim
My favorite US prototype loco is the N&W class J. #604 resides in a display case, along with the other 4-8-4’s in my ‘nostalgia’ collection.
My favorite locomotive is a protolance - Tomikawa Valley Railway #42, a brass 0-8-0T (Baldwin, 1897) started life as a kit version of Imperial Government Railways class 4020. 25+ years ago I removed the buffers, installed a cross-compound air pump on the side of the smokebox, put air tanks and radiator coils on top of the side tanks, mounted Kadee couplers in plastic draft gear boxes and put it into service on my just-built ‘coal mine at the end of the railroad’ module. It has been in almost continuous service ever since.
The modifications matched those made to IGR locomotives that survived into the post Pacific War era, but the 4020 class was actually scrapped while hook-and-link coupling, buffers and vacuum brakes were still standard. In my fictional history, instead of being cut up to make hull plates for IJN cruisers, that loco was bought by an expanding colliery to handle longer coal trains downhill.
Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
I have P2K N&W & VGN 2-8-8-2s, a PCM N&W Y6b, a couple of Riv N&W Y6bs, BLI N&W Class As, BLI N&W Class Js, Bachmann Spectrum K1 4-8-2 (almost through an N&W bashing), a BLI VGN 2-8-2, an Athearn VGN 2-8-2s, an Athearn VGN 4-6-2, a brass N&W Class J, a P2K VGN Berk, a brass N&W K2a Streamlined, and a P2K 0-8-0, and a few others. My roads are N&W and VGN. Absolute favorite engine is my brass J, and it was my very first HO engine. After that I like them all about equally for different reasons. The P2K 2-8-8-2s are excellent because you could really tailor the old undec versions to custom fit a need, with a slew of excellent fitting extra parts, and they all run like a watch.
My brass J is custom painted # 608, because that’s the one I got to sit/stand in the engineer’s seat and blow the whistle as she backed down to the ‘Arrow’ in the early AM, on a day so long ago now.
Thanks for asking!
My BLI Duplex 4-4-4-4 is articulated, but the real article was not. Still, it runs like a Swiss watch and I consider myself most lucky to have it.
The Lionel Challenger, another Swiss watch, is my only “articulated” engine, although one of Santa’s helpers hinted that I may get a distant “cousin” for Christmas, something about “Six Bee”, whatever.
Still, though, and with 10 carefully considered purchases since I entered the hobby, my favourite loco does not appear willing to relinquish the top position on the podium. It is the venerable BLI Pennsy J1 2-10-4. The J1’s had boosters that gave them more tractive effort than the UP Challenger. Just on two massive cylinders. The Bessemer & Lake Erie 2-10-4’s were quite a bit bigger and more powerful yet! (Where can I get me one of those!)
Wow, if I could pick a favorite then maybe I would not have so many…
For a large layout I really like the BLI Santa Fe 37xx class 4-8-4. The Northerns are just one of the classiest locomotives ever built, the Santa Fe used them so effectively all across their line, and they are equally at home in freight or passenger service. I don’t really like the QSI sound in it, but it isn’t so detailed (like some of the brass models) that I am worried about running it, and after fixing the initial valve gear binding problems they run really well.
For a small layout I have a brass NYC 0-6-0 with the short (not sloped) tender. It has a can motor and can go through a 13" radius curve and #4 turnout like nothing.
ditto. Such cool things about each one. I would probably have to say I like the CB&Q the most - not because it is better to model, but in real life the CB&Q set the standard of how a railroad was supposed to be managed and run. They never went bankrupt. They paid stock holders a dividend every year. They kept the GN & NP financially stable through the depression. They were almost single handedly responsible for keeping all the RRs out of USRA hands during WWII. They were the incubator for many of the railroad excecutives who rose to be presidents, general managers, & supers of many other railroads across the US & South America.
I have the A, the Y6B and several J’s for my N&W collection in addition to some others.
You need a J to complete the main three locomotives the N&W used until 1958.
Favorite locomotive?? That is a hard question that changes from time to time. It is hard to find a better overall workhorse for the midwest than a NKP 2-8-4 S2 or S3. I was raised in the flatlands of the Midwest and articulated locomotives were not used.
Cheers
My favorite steam locomotive is my Sneaky Falls and Western Class 3862 No 3862 - actually the SF&W only had one locomotive but they sure didn’t want to give it the number one; after all they were a and Western railroad - produced by Knapp in 1945 * * * * * or was it 1942 * * * * * or was it 1990 * * * * * or was it 1963 * * * * * who knows? who cares?
I have a variety of different steam locomotives, 70 in all! I have a BLI N&W Class A, A BLI C&O T-1, A BLI PRR M-1a, A Proto 2K N&W 2-8-8-2, A Proto 2K C&O 2-8-4, Bachman Spectrum C&O, RF&P, N&W 4-8-2, A Rivarossi C&O 2-6-6-6, A Bachman Spectrum N&W Class J 4-8-4, Rivarossi UP FEF 4-8-4, Rivarossi UP 4-8-8-4 just to name a few! They all are very great locomotives, All run superbly. I have to say that I do not have a certain favorite. I love them all, including some of my old Tyco-Mantua locomotives. The best thing is that when I want to run a different locomotive, I got a choice. We are so fortunate to have so many great manufacturers producing great realistic locomotives these days to choose from! And they all run in DC-DCC and have sound! Isnt it great! 
Y6B my fav, but not limited to it course I have p2k 2-8-4, AHM also, Bowser 4-8-8-4, 2 challengers, 3 2-6-6-6 (RR, Arbour, Winton), 3 RR Y6b, 2 Cab Forwards, RR, NKP NKP 4-6-4 L1a,
plus more…