Hi Mark
French Märklin HO user here with a CS3 and a 100 W Märklin power pack. My layout, with 26 MFX Sound locos needs 4.1 A (lots of illuminated cars)
Here are a few points:
- does the CS3 show any current when NOT connected to the track? If yes, the unit is faulty and must be returned for repair.
- when power the faulty section with another source (CS3 / Booster 1 / Booster 2) Is the same current level reported? If Yes you have a short on the section in question

Note: some short may have a limited current because of weak wiring / long rails

Cheers
Jean

Hello Jean,

Thank you I really appreciate your responses:
1) The GFP-1 does not show any amps if I disconnect the track power
2) On your second question if i am reading correctly, when I took the top section which works perfectly and used its power pack and booster I did get the same amperage and same problem.
3) I checked this morning getting 19V to the whole bottom section track however one of the runs the power coming off the main bus going around the whole layout was not getting a good connectiion. I checked
every feeder point as there are 4 main lines with 5 long runs as seen in the picture. All were good except the one. I fixed that but no difference.
I think the "overload message is more what you pointed out a possible short as i was putting a small loco while the layout was idle and did not get it on properly and it shorted of course and got the same overload message. I think its misleading as " Overload" which I would interpret as exceeding the amperage.
One thing I did notice yesterday was at one point while two trains were running and the amperage meter on the GFP-1 went to max for a second and was yellow and orange.
I do have 12awg wiring for the Bus and 18awg for the feeder tracks. I have five long runs as seen in the picture.

Thanks,
Mark.

Jean,

Thank you, I love all the info and you taking the time. I will work on those.
I went to every distribution point of the Bus wire where the feeders go to the track and disconected each one and then had my Wlan mobile station started the trains after disconnecting but made no difference after 30 secs they stopped.
I then decided to take the two wires from the Booster with clips and connect direct to the track. Ran the same two trains that a few minutes ago were stopping every 30 secs. For the first time they ran flawlessly. I checked the furtherst distance as the layout is large 19 x 15 and the the voltage was at about 15V where before 19V, makes sense as it has to carry a long way. I then ran a third train that caused an overload but not sure if it's due to insufficient power. The interesting thing is when I powered the track directly off the rail the Amperage dropped to 1.99 which was almost 1/2 an amp...very interesting.

Hello Jean,
Well after many many hours of trouble shooting here is where I stand.
I suspected somewhere there was an overload, what throgh me off was using the Upper booster to the lower track which is the problem.
i checked connection, the track and some very intensive troubleshooting.
I even tried a bunch of different engines but no go.
Finally I decided to eliminate all the boosters and try with just the CS3.
At one point I had two TGV's 10 piece and 4 additional engines running flawlessly for 15-20 minutes.
The output current to the track was measuring 16.5 V whereas the same measuremeny on the Boosters to the track was 19.5V.
If you measure yout track power what voltage do you get?
If you have the 100 watt Booster what output power do you get?
In one of the posts the gentleman asked why is the voltage 21.7 V

Thanks,
Mark.

The bottom section right now running all the TGV's on the CS3 only is working perfectly no problems - 17V to the track.
The CS3 is a max 3amp and with the TGV's you see in the original picture, plus about 7 other engines idle the 4 trains are running perfectly. On the 5 amp booster it would overload at two or three trains.
I believe that the update recently to the Booster could be a problem. The document highlights the "overload" message that they put in update 2.5. It appears to me, as I get the same behavior that
the firmware has somehow restricted the amperage instead of the 5 amp it should get, its not really gettting and it happens with both Boosters.
When I run with the CS3 and just go over the 3 amp it overloads which is the correct behavior. In fact you see the the gauge go from green to yellow to orange and if it goes over the 3 amp it cuts off with "overload" which I would expect.
If i switch to a booster on that same track same engines that has 5 amp it will overload which tells me the booster thinks it has sufficient Amps but it really does not.

I would like to downgrade the firmware to an earlier version on the Booster to see what happens.
Any easy way to do that ?
Thanks,
Mark

Jean,

I believe my suspicion has come true,it looks like the latest firmware for the 60175 Boosters are the problem thats why both dont work.
I just downgraded from Version 2.5.2 (6) to cs3update_v2.41.0 and together with that update there were Booster updates as well.

I disconnected the CS3 track power and connected the Lower booster to the track, ran the exact 4 TGV's that I had run previously with direct track power of the CS3.
The amperage of the CS3 was just below 3 amps and ran perfectly, with the booster the same scenario,it wolud have overloaded.
See the picture attached showing 2.77amp (CS3)

The 17 V reading on your CS3 is trange to me. Is it the reading provided by the CS3 or another method?
I found that with the Märklin PSUs I have the voltage is comprized between 19.4V to 19.6V. Are the mains voltage correct?
Cheers
Jean

Hi Jean,

I now ran the same 4 TGV's with the Booster connected and the downgraded Ver 3.85 of the booster and for the first time it never overloaded, infact if you look the picture above showing GFP-1 Lower it now is able to draw 3.44 amps with the same amount of trains running.
The reason this happened is now the Booster went over 3 amps whereas before with the same 4 trains it only got to 2.89 and was being throttled.
This is what I said before the Booster thinks it has 5 amps however there is a firmware bug that is not letting it go above 3 amps even though no indication with yellow, orange or red warnings like the CS3 shows.
So,currently the CS3 is running with the Ver 2.5.2(6) but the boosters are running the previous version 3.85 as you don't have to always update them, they are independent from the main update.
The red dots are on the Booster indicating an update to 3.88 which I believe is the problematic firmware and proven consistently with my testing.
Now that I know where the issue is I am going to update the booster back to Ver 3.88 and see if the overload error re-occurs. If it does then the Booster firmware has a bug and it makes sense as both boosters have the same issue.

I just updated from Version 3.85 seen in the above photo to Ver 3.88 and Voila!!! the overload appeared just like before with the same trains so everything is consistent. I will contact Marklin, they will need to fix the throttling in the booster Ver 3.88 part of ver 2.5.2(6)
I went and reverted the Boosters to the previous 3.85 and am running back to normal. Once Marklin figures it out I will update in the next version however right now it's working beautifully.
Thanks once again for all your help, you have been amazing!!

Yes, and love everyone of them. it upsets me when things dont work