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How To Test Golf Cart Batteries: 4 Easy Ways

How To Test Golf Cart Batteries: 4 Easy Ways

Electric golf carts have made many lives easier. These environment friendly, convenient vehicles can be used on and off the golf course because of their smooth functionality. But their batteries are not cheap. Before you discard them, we'll teach you how to test golf cart batteries, so nothing goes to waste.

A Quick Guide: How to Check Golf Cart Batteries

There are many reasons why learning how to test golf cart batteries is essential. Whether you're doing it for routine maintenance or as evaluation before buying new ones, this knowledge is handy.

Test Golf Batteries with A Multimeter

Step 1 - fully charge the battery rack of your cart.

Step 2 - Set the multimeter at 200v DC.

Step 3 - Use the multimeter across the battery's individual posts.

Step 4 - Note the results: The reading of a 6-volt battery is between 6.1 to 6.3. Readings as low as 4.1 mean one of the cells of this battery unit is bad or shorted.

Test Golf Batteries with A Hydrometer

A hydrometer is relatively inexpensive and is used to measure specific gravity.

The gravity of plain water is 1.000. A fully charged battery has a sulfuric acid that will test 1.280, and a discharged battery will have a 1.145 result.

  • Step 1 - Draw electrolytes into the hydrometer so the thermometer can adjust to the electrolyte's temperature.
  • Step 2 - Learn to observe the electrolyte color. Gray or brown means your battery's lifespan is about to end. 
  • Step 3 - Bring the hydrometer to eye level and observe the reading where the float's scale meets the electrolyte. 
  • Step 4 - Note the results of each cell in the battery and compare it after completing the tests. 
  • Step 5 - If there is a disparity of 50 points in the reading between two cells, the lower cell has a problem.

Test Golf Batteries with Load Testing

A load tester is a golf cart battery tester that will give you excellent battery health insight.

  • Step 1 - Put a dummy load on the battery so you can see its performance. 
  • Step 2 - Hook the load tester to the terminals of your battery. 
  • Step 3 - Press a button on the tester to bring the resistor into the circuit, putting load on the battery. 
  • Step 4 - Note the results: Healthy batteries drop .2 to .4 volts, which means your car batteries are failing.

Test Golf Batteries with Discharge Testing

This is an expensive method and is not recommended if you learn how to test golf cart batteries yourself.

  • Step 1 - The device is hooked across the whole bank of batteries, putting them under resistance load. 
  • Step 2 - Wait a few minutes for the results. It will inform you how long you can still run your cart based on the battery's decay rate.

Conclusion

Knowing how to test golf cart batteries is a part of cart maintenance. This useful information will allow you to make the most of your batteries before you decide on spending for new ones.