Thankful today, indeed!

The BCR is not a miracle device that will save a 5 volt board from sudden death.  In fact there is no evidence to support that a BCR will even prolong the life of those boards for even a minute.  The problem with those boards are defective capacitors made in the early 2000's that were used in many other industries as well.  The fate of 5 volt board is already determined, I doubt a BCR will change that for the better.

To each there own but my fleet of 5 volt PS2 engines will never get a BCR and the reason is the same as your last post about batteries. Every time you power up a 5V PS2 with a BCR the charging circuit has to work as hard as possible to get the super cap fully charged whereas a battery holds charge for quite a bit longer and a daily ran 5v PS2 engine with a battery doesn't work the charging circuit very hard.  Capacitors lose charge in a few hours and the board has to charge a dead "battery" the next running session.

A BCR will stress many of the components of an already fragile 5 volt board right to max of their design limits and then some... doesn't sound like a great way to make them last longer.

@H1000 posted:

...a daily ran 5v PS2 engine with a battery doesn't work the charging circuit very hard.

Not on everyone's daily schedule.  Certainly not mine.

I see photos of a lot of this hobby's enthusiasts/collectors displaying engines on shelves between runs.  I would imagine the batt on some of these 5vPS2's is not quite up to par if/when they're finally called to make a run.  I have about 2 dozen  PS1 and 5vPS2 locos.  Running them every day to keep the battery charged is not going to happen in this house on my daily...often unpredictable...schedule.  (You're fortunate, indeed, if your schedule accommodates this, however!)

OTOH, allowing these electromechanical marvels a couple minutes low voltage idling at start-up is, IMHO, just good practice regardless of their genre or because they are equipped with a BCR.  Besides, several minutes of start-up bantering twixt unseen crew members complements a cup of joe or a glass of vin, mug-o-suds before the manifest starts to roll.

I fully understand the final chapter has not necessarily played out on these 10 engines.  I weighed a lot of opinions before making this effort.  It's not a panacea.  It's a choice.

Thanks for your opinion, though.

Oh, BTW, re "the BCR is not a miracle device"?...wife would dispute this.  Septuagenarians (she says) are tough to please, give smiles grudgingly, seldom express boundless joy after doing anything repetitively for, say, 20+ engines (PS1+5vPS2) and have them all do as they're supposed to when started/operated!   Yeah, she'd say they performed a miracle for this ol' phart!

There's always tomorrow...and the 11PM gnus...to slap ya down again!

All my PS1 and PS2 engines have BCRs, and none have had problems caused by startup with a dead battery. And, so far, for more than 15 years, there haven't been any failures of the BCRs. Of course, a BCR will not prevent the eventual failure of a PS2 circuit board due to an aging capacitor. For what it's worth, one thing I do when starting an engine with a BCR is to advance the transformer throttle slowly to about 6 volts and then let the BCR charge at 6 volts for a moment. Then, I advance the throttle slowly to 9 to 12 volts to complete the charging of the BCR for one minute. This reduces the initial charging current output by the charging circuit and applied to the BCR. It probably is better for the charging circuit than just applying 9 to 12 volts abruptly.

MELGAR

Hi, KD,  Its always a great sense of accomplishment to get our equipment in running condition.  I am not very familiar with the 5 volt PS2 boards, and wonder if there are/were any replacement options.  Best, Dave

@dkdkrd posted:

Besides, several minutes of start-up bantering twixt unseen crew members complements a cup of joe or a glass of vin, mug-o-suds before the manifest starts to roll.

Love your attitude here.  Hobbies are meant to encourage relaxation, ours included.

This is a great example, and fortunately there are many more as well.

Mike