I've been away from the hobby for many years. Can somebody post a short synopsis of which Stewart diesels are which, particularly in regard to drives, please. I'm looking to buy NOS F units. Anything I should avoid? Thanks. SRN
Welcome at TrainBoard, SRN. I own two U 25. I've bought them used some time ag. I was told they are Stewart with Kato drive. They run good. Wolfgang
I own three DCC Ready Bowser/Stewart VO-1000's, two with Tsuanmi and one with LokSound decoders. I installed the decoders and speakers. Very good runners on DC, nice and quiet. Mine are very easy to take apart. Only four screws to hold the motor in place. Everything else snaps s together. No idea about the other types. Check the Bowser site very carefully, there is a lot of info there. Check ebay also for what you would like. My three VO1000's where $50 each and a few dollars for shipping. There are good sellers for this brand of DCC ready locos. They came with a jumper for DC operation. Rich
You won't go wrong with Stewart's. They were built with a Kato drive mechanism or chassis and run sweet. These gorgeous little ladies turned the heads of many a modeler when they first came out. All of a sudden quality was redefined and we had some fine running locomotives. You may need to add some handrails, eye hooks, grab rails, window wipers, air hoses for MU'ing. Other then that you will get hours of railroading out of them.
Stewart Locomotive I have a collection of Stewart locomotives that replicate Baldwin, EMD and GE. Most have Kato drives and are among the smoothest runners that I own. A few had Athearn drives (some U25B's, RS12's) that aren't as good but are efficient. Stewart got away from using Kato drives and started using one of its' own. Not as good, noiser, but with some fine tuning, still reliable.
Thanks everyone. Is there some way to tell if the loco does not have a Kato drive by the model number or something like that? I'm mostly looking at F units on EBay.
