Thanks for the replies. To answer the last question, no, the armature is not centered in the field. One layer of lamination sticks out past the field. I put it all back together and it runs like a watch. I will post a pic of the motor tomorrow.
I cannot see how this would happen unless washers were placed in between the bearing and armature. I took a dental pic and probed around in there and there are no thrust washers. Best guess is somehow it was made that way. I tried to put an NOS red brush plate I had on it for looks. The red plate has staked on brush tubes and they hit the armature face. I could not even tighten the screw down.....Odd issue, but unless I want to send it out i suppose I need to live with it. Either way the loco is a super runner. I was always told these 46' berks were difficult to tune and poor runners, but this one is superb!
