@CurlSnout posted:Thanks for a speedy reply. My usual habit with locomotives in which I have a BCR installed is to turn on the transformer, advance the throttle a little over midway, and wait for a couple of minutes before I attempt to get things moving. It was my understanding that a minute or so is sufficient to get a good charge on the BCR.
In my situation, the sounds do not decline gradually when I drop the throttle to zero. Rather, the sounds just stop very abruptly - that is, the sounds do NOT continue after I power down the locomotive. Is that consistent with a possible fault somewhere in the charging circuit? Maybe I should charge up one of those green batteries and try with that.
Edited for clarification and sorry for the typos:
Yes, that clearly sounds like failed charging. Is it the BCR or the 20 year old PS1 lower board not charging up the BCR? Obviously, that needs tested, but "something" isn't working.
This is why when I install a BCR, I bench test to see if it is charging up. The basic test is power up for at least 60 seconds and then check if the engine continues sound with power dropped. If that test fails, then the 9V battery snap connector also allows easy in parallel measuring the the BCR terminals while charging (because both the positive and negative posts can be accessed with meter probes from the sides). I'm looking for the DC voltage to rise when track power is applied. If I see no rise, or it stops at a low voltage (say like 4V) or some other value, then there is something wrong. So then test with no BCR or battery installed and the open 9V battery snap of the engine during power and see what the charging circuit of the PS1 lower board is putting out.
Because if a charged 9V works, we could be fooling ourselves into thinking charging is working, but in reality it's just the residual charge in the battery and eventually will go dead. Sure, you can "limp home mode" run one and manually charge the battery, but bottom line, that PS1 lower board may or may not be working.
