Club Car Precedent Charging Problem

Wakatipu91

New Member
I have a 2008 Precedent golf cart with a charging problem. It is showing the following behavior. When I plug in the Club Car charger it begins, after several seconds, to charge. The charger makes a humming sound. The amp meter on the charger swings all the way to the right, beyond the maximum 15 amp point and "pegs" against the right side of the meter. If the charger is left connected, it does charge the cart batteries (according to the charge meter in the cart). At the end of 30 minutes or so the charger is so hot to the touch that it can not be held.

The charger has been checked twice at shops and I am told it is charging correctly. I have not seen the testing but am told that the meter displays with the normal range. The onboard computer has been evaluated and it is evidently not the problem. When the cart batteries are statically tested (no load) they each test around 12.1 - 12.2 volts.

Any suggestions what I might check out prior to handing the problem over to a repair shop?
 

HotRodCarts

Cartaholic
Both of my Cub Car Precedent battery chargers do the same thing. If the battery voltage is real low before plugging in the battery chargers the chargers get pretty hot. Is the 12.1 - 12.2 volts after the batteries have been charged? Welcome to Cartaholics Golf Cart Forum. :hattip:
 

Wakatipu91

New Member
The volts I mentioned is when the batteries are charged, I believe. I will check this further. My charger gets so hot I can not pick it up by the handle. I have to let it sit unplugged for at least a half hour to carry it comfortably. Does yours get that hot? The battery display on the cart shows the charge level at 50% when I have typically set it to charge, due to being concerned about damaging something. but the "meter over max" and the heat will happen even if the batteries are already charged. Does your charger meter stay below 15 when charging?
 

HotRodCarts

Cartaholic
If the voltage you posted is after a charge you have battery problems. Have you checked to see if the batteries need water?
 

Wakatipu91

New Member
Checked a while back but not recently. Will do so tomorrow. So do your chargers get as hot as I described? And does your charge meter stay below 15?
 

HotRodCarts

Cartaholic
It depends on how low the voltage is on the battery pack but I've seen my chargers peg the needle hard enough that you can here the click. The lower the voltage the hotter my chargers get. If you have bad batteries the charger is going to get hotter trying to charge them.
 

Wakatipu91

New Member
Had to wait for a rainy spell to pass, but now I am back at the detective work. I checked the water levels on the batteries (it is a 4 x 12 system) and they all looked ok. I then used a battery tester (with load) to see what I could learn. With no load the batteries all read around 12.1-12.2 volts. However, under load three of the batteries read about 10.0 volts and the other read about 10.5.

So I am thinking that the batteries are probably the cause of the charging problem. While the batteries will take a charge I suspect that the over heating charger and pegging amp meter are indications that the charger is struggling to do its job. Does this sound like a reasonable conclusion?

This cart is new to me. Looking the batteries over, they are tagged as being manufactured in February 2018. They are also rated at 25 AH. To my understanding this is about as low of an amp hour rating as one might find in a cart. So under the premise that I will be getting new batteries I am now wondering what amp hour rating I should buy. I can believe that these batteries are in the shape they are in because they were actually insufficient to running this cart in its previous life.

I am not using this cart on a golf course, but rather for casual occasional use in a level RV park that is roughly 3/4 of a mile by 1/2 of a mile in dimension. Any advice about a satisfactory AH rating for this scenario would be greatly appreciated. Doing an initial survey I am seeing that there is a WIDE range of cost along with AH rating.

So I am looking for replacement 12V batteries for a 2008 Club Car Precedent 4x12 that will be in a moderate use environment.

Thanks.
 

HotRodCarts

Cartaholic
Are the batteries in your cart golf cart batteries? What brand are they? More than likely the charger is getting hot because it's trying to charge weak/bad batteries. If you're going to buy new batteries I'd get Trojan T-1275's. They may cost more but they'll last a lot longer than the batteries you have now. Like I mentioned earlier in the thread none of the 12 volt golf cart batteries will last as long as the 6 and 8 volt batteries. Club Car went back you using six 8 volt batteries and they sell a conversion kit if you want to go that route. New Trojan T-1275 batteries should last at least 4 years if you take care of them.
 

Diode

Cartaholic - V.I.P. Sponsor
I think you have a handle on it now that sounds exactly right as far as heating the charger
 

JRay

Cartaholic
Grandsons 06 prec. showing the same symptoms as cart above. I will load test it in the am to see if its a battery issue.
 

Wakatipu91

New Member
First a clarification about the old battery situation. The batteries, once uncabled and removed, turned out to be Duracell 150AH (I misread the partly obscured labels).

I replaced them with Trojan 150AH batteries and the behavior is changed in the following manner. The charge meter no longer exceeds 15, the max is about 12. As the charge proceeds the amp meter reading drops to about 6 and seems to remain there. As long as I have waited it drops no further and the charger continues to hum. I am interpreting this as meaning that the charger is not turning off. My reading of the manual indicates that the charger will turn off automatically when the batteries are done charging.

Does this mean that I need to wait longer for the charge to complete? Or is there still something still not right with the charging system and batteries?
 

Wakatipu91

New Member
Longest has been about 4 hours. But the amp showed no additional drop below 6 for the last 2 hours. Very steady at 6
 

HotRodCarts

Cartaholic
Like JRay said it can take up to 16 hours to fully charge especially with new batteries. Let the charger run until it shuts off on it's own. If the charger hasn't shut off after 16 hours unplug it and let us know.

Anyone have a link to that conversion kit. 4 12.s to 6 8,s.
I don't have a link but here's the Club Car part numbers for the 12 volt to 8 volt battery conversion kit. The kit is around $500 including the plastic battery bucket.

AM1275201 - Precedent 12 volt to 8 volt battery conversion kit
103368401 - Precedent battery bucket assembly
 

JRay

Cartaholic
Checked out grandsons precedent today, cleaned all the cables, it has 2015 t 1275 trojans in it. Under load one battery falls under 12 volts. 11.95. The other 3 are over 12. It was a little low on water. Been on the charger now about 4 hrs. meter dropping normally. I see his stereo is hooked to the weak battery. I will move that. At this point when charge is complete i say run it.
 
Top