Re-Awakening a RK PS1 Big Boy (Complete)

PLEASE!  Do yourself a favor and get rid of that old white battery!  You may think it's OK, but it's long past it's due date.

Have you tried the usual, doing a Reset 18?  You may also have to use the Reset 27 to set the chuff rate.  Did you see this in your manual?

I second what John said. Loose that white battery and put in a new MTH green battery. I wouldn't put another volt to that engine before I did that. 

Agree with all above. The the sounds cut out when power is interupted, the battery is junk.

I just BCR's in my engines and was well worth it.

Go the BCR route. I put BCR's in all my PS-1 locos at about their 5 year mark and all of them still run just like new today.

I have a brick-and-mortar Harbor Freight along my commuting route so I'll get some of their NiMH 9V's. Figure on another 12 hours to charge afterwards and I'll see what develops then.

The original battery I'll repurpose to some other device.

New NiMH 9V's acquired. One is being charged, so tomorrow night I'll swap batteries and resume testing.

What would be a good rundown test for the old NiCD? Something I can just connect (with or without the voltmeter) and see how long it lasts till its voltage collapses.

---PCJ

My rundown test for the old MTH white battery is to see how fast I can hit the trash can with it!  IMO, there's no point to trying to save a NiCad battery that's that old.

The first one I retired went into a Ethernet cable tester, where it served quite well for a number of weeks on a single charge (I was making my own cables while building out my home network).

I get it that it should never see the inside of a train ever again. I just have a few devices that won't poot their magic smoke if the battery voltage suddenly dives under load

---PCJ

Installed the Harbor Freight NiMH battery. VOM shows a solid 9.5 volts after full trickle charge.

I have sound between direction changes now, but no chuff while moving, just the background hiss. 

---PCJ

Do a Reset-18, you'll get your chuff back.

For some reason my Z4000 wil only display a "function" number 52 when 'Program' is pressed, and will only scroll between numbers 50 and 99. 

I ran through the function select manually, performed the Reset 18 and everything is operating normally, save for some drawbar adjustment (for some reason the engine drawbar is sprung upwards and the tender drawbar is sprung downwards) to get the two units to stay together without too much disagreement with switches.

---PCJ

That's odd about the Z4000, I've used the Program a few times.  I'm glad the manual reset worked, I just had to do that to a repair a couple days ago, same symptoms.  

I don't think we can fix the drawbar with a software reset!

Hi the reason your getting a 52 reset you have to have the transformer all the way closed for no voltage output, then you can get 1 to reset 18 no problem,try it and let me know. i have the exact same big boy engine and i know the reset 18 will work but the throttle must be closed before you hit the program key then you can count up from 1 to eighteen or what ever you want OK.

Try and let me know how you make out!

Alan