BCR vs Battery

[Anonymous]

Since the trains spend most of the time in the closets, for now anyways, I ordered a BCR unit to try out. I received one and tried it out in a MTH 381. The thing works great, just as described. Plus I don't have to take the trains apart now to get access to the batteries. Seems like the hot ticket if you don't run your trains much.
Paul

[underworld]

Sounds good....keep us posted on it's performance.

underworld

[:D][:D][:D][:D][:D]

[Anonymous]

I run one of my command lionel locos in tradition and found the battery device worthless as the loco needs constant voltage to produce sounds at less than 9 volts and only a battery will do that. The BCR is good for about 5 seconds on low voltage sound.
In a proto one loco it is fine except if you like to hear your diesel shutdown sequence when you turn off the track voltage you won;t as the BCR will not supply voltage for that.
It is a good device with limitations and for 25 bucks I can put in allot of batteries.
Dave.

[Anonymous]

What is a BCR? I googled it and got everything from Banco Central Reserva to Babson College Radio to Bibliographical Center for Research to Business Communications Review to British Car Rental to Bolsa Comercio de Rosario. The only thing I didn't get is something that looked like it would replace a battery.

And while you are about it, what is MPC. Last time I used that acronym it stood for military payment certificates, the script that the military uses to impede the black market.

[Jim Duda]

QUOTE: It is a good device with limitations and for 25 bucks I can put in allot of batteries.
Dave.

Point taken...but there are a lot of folks who get annoyed by removing the shell from a tender or, worse yet, from a diesel and/or steamer. Betcha' 90% of the folks that bought the BCR did it to avoid removing those shells.

If it were me, I'd spend the money and add a charging jack to the PS-1 stuff. Changing out batteries every 3 - 5 years is still annoying, but doable...

[spankybird]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Skyray

What is a BCR? I googled it and got everything from Banco Central Reserva to Babson College Radio to Bibliographical Center for Research to Business Communications Review to British Car Rental to Bolsa Comercio de Rosario. The only thing I didn't get is something that looked like it would replace a battery.

And while you are about it, what is MPC. Last time I used that acronym it stood for military payment certificates, the script that the military uses to impede the black market.

Here you go Doug

http://www.jandwelectronics.com

[Anonymous]

Dave (northern 1),
Did you install just the BCR alone?
Pat

[Anonymous]

Yep, there would be no reason for both a battery and a bcr.

[prewardude]

Anyone want to take bets on when MTH comes out with a BCR-type device, themselves? It seems strange that Mike Wolf & company have waited this long to respond to the BCR.

[Anonymous]

Dave,
If all you installed was the BCR, then it will never work. the BCR needs a charging circuit to work. Lionel does not have a charging circuit in their engine. You have to add one, which is available from the BCR manufacture.
Prewardude,
Check this out, http://www.mthhotrains.com/models.asp notice it says "battery free operation". It seems that MTH has stolen the idea and put it in their new HO proto sound 3 system.

[Chris F]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Skyray

And while you are about it, what is MPC.

MPC = Model Products Corporation, a division of General Mills (cereal company) that leased the rights to the Lionel name and purchased the tooling from the original Lionel Corporations in 1969. This was the start of the Modern era of Lionel trains (as opposed to prewar and postwar). A reorganization in 1975 separated Lionel from MPC, then dumped Lionel, MPC, and Craft-Master in a "basket" called Fundimensions. Even so, Lionel trains manufactured up until 1986 were called MPC.

[Anonymous]

The qsi system for dcc in ho requires no battery so why would mth not copy it. They will be owned by qsi anyway after the lawsuit., or maybe we do not know of a plan with qsi to get out of the lawsuit.
This is all conjecture on my part and not based on any fact. Dave.

[prewardude]

Thanks for the link, Pat. Intriguing.

[Anonymous]

I had J&W "reprogram" my new MTH PS-1 engine, and they installed a BCR at the same time (in fact, Wayne, the "W" in J&W told me that nothing leaves his shop without a BCR installed.) I bought the engine "new" on eBay from a dealer that was going out of business. It was still new in the box, but the battery was nearly dead and when I tried to use it, it scrambled my chip. So I shipped the whole thing to J&W, and Wayne had it back in 2 weeks, good as new. Very nice company to deal with.

As for the shutdown sounds with the BCR: mine work just fine. When you kill the power to the track, the engine will still idle for a few seconds, then sounds a bell to let you know the power is off, and if you don't turn it back on, you'll hear the diesel shutdown sounds.

The BCR is highly recommended for PS-1 engines, as the low battery voltage/chip scrambling problem was/is pretty common on those engines, from what I've been told. With the BCR, you won't ever have that problem again, and the only drawback (and it isn't much of one) is that you just have to let the engine idle for a minute when you start your session to allow the BCR's cacacitor to charge. Then you're good to go, you can run it, shut it down, and start it right back up (if you stop for more than 3-4 hours, then you have to go through the charging process again.) Well worth the $25, IMHO.[:)]

[alton6]

Who and where would be J&W?

Carl

[prewardude]

www.jandwelectronics.com

[alton6]

prewardude,

Thanks. I hadn't heard of them.

Carl

[Anonymous]

Another point worth mentioning is on the 408E and 381 you have to bend tabs to get the cab off to service the batteries. I'm not sure how many bendings it takes to snap them off and I don't want to find out. The BCR eliminates this situation also.
Paul

[Dave45681]

QUOTE: Originally posted by bakdoor

...The BCR is highly recommended for PS-1 engines, as the low battery voltage/chip scrambling problem was/is pretty common on those engines, from what I've been told. With the BCR, you won't ever have that problem again, and the only drawback (and it isn't much of one) is that you just have to let the engine idle for a minute when you start your session to allow the BCR's cacacitor to charge.....

I am pretty sure it's still possible to scramble a chip with a BCR if you don't wait long enough for the cap to charge. If you partially charge the cap, and then try to get out of reset, you are effectively doing the same thing as if you had a weak (or dead) battery.

As long as you let it charge per recomendations, you should be fine.

I still think it's a relatively neat product to compensate for a flawed design though.

[spankybird]

QUOTE: by Dave45681
I am pretty sure it's still possible to scramble a chip with a BCR if you don't wait long enough for the cap to charge.

I don't believe that is true. The scramble chip comes from a battery that is near dead or dead and reverse polarity. It is when the plus become minus that you scramble the chips.

If you don't let the BRC charge, you may not have forward, natural, reverse or it will loose sound going over switches.

[Anonymous]

Dave 45681,
You are partially right about not waiting and scrambling the chip. If your engine is not on the list of engines that where known to scramble chips, then you should have no problems not waiting. Two things can happen, one the engine will not move, or the engine will run and while you are running the engine the BCR fully charges. There are some Proto Sound engines that will run without a battery. I would not recommend finding out if your engine can do that, unless you know someone that has the same engine, and runs without a battery.
Spankybird,
You are partially right also. The battery can reverse polarity. By that time who knows if the sound board is scrambled, because you just damaged the power supply board.
After talking to Wayne at J and W Electronics here's what I do. Turn the track power on to less than 12 volts, or less than the voltage your engine needs to arm the proto coupler. I set mine at 10 volts. This is a good voltage for the engine to start and to run at. After just 20-30 seconds I hit the directional button, leave the transformer handle alone. The engine takes off. You have to run the engine at least 30 seconds or more to get a full charge on the BCR, or if you plan on using the transformer handle to cycle the engine or to shut it down. But you can use the directional button to cycle the engine, providing the track voltage is not above 12 volts.
I don't have any engine on the list of engines that can scramble, so I would not recommend it for all PS1 engines. If your engine runs without a battery, you don't have to wait at all. If your engine is on the list, wait a minute, maybe 2 minutes, maybe 1/2 hour!
Pat

[waltrapp]

QUOTE: But you can use the directional button to cycle the engine, providing the track voltage is not above 12 volts.

Pat, thank you for offering that comment! I installed a BCR in a PS1 engine this past Christmas and was controlling that piece of trackage with a brand new Z1000 from and MTH set. The direction button would not cycle the engine. I thought the button was defective!

Too bad I can't prove this until I start setting up the layout again in October, but this is one I'm anxious to test out!

thanks - walt

[Dave45681]

Pat, (746j)

Thanks for enhancing my comment.

Sorry to everyone I didnt' check back for a few days (saw Spankybirds post shortly after he wrote it), but I wanted to get a chance to review my notes and figure where I got that idea from.

I had a printed out interview with Andy Edelman and a group called the MTH Battery Coalition that was sometime in early 2003. In that interview, Andy mentioned that if you had less than 5 volts on the battery, the system could get confused and scramble the chip (assuming you had one of the boards that does this). He did acknowledge that he did not have any further technical detail, and that QSI would probably have to expand on that explanation since it was ultimately their design .

[Anonymous]

Dave,
That makes sense to how I am running my engines. The BCR reaches 5 volts in a about 15 seconds.
Pat