Powerwise Charger run times

[chasenfish16]

I have a 2002 PDS cart with 2008 Energizer batteries in it. It appears to charge fine by the state of charge sheet floating around and it passes a load test. I get around 12-15 continous miles around the neighborhood wich is quite hilly. My question is my powerwise charger will only run for about 4 hours after the batteries are discharged to around 50% and the big mystery is the charger always shuts off around 10 amps, which I think is to high. I would think it would go to at least 5. I do not think it is getting a finishing trickle charge. Can anyone running this type of charger tell me the amps their charger shuts off, and if anyone knows why mine appears to shut off early, your info would be greatly appreciated.

 

[HotRodCarts]

With good batteries and everything in good working order the amp meter should drop close to 0 for the last 1-2 hours. 4 hours doesn't seem long enough for a pack at 50%.

 

[chasenfish16]

Does anyone use a 2002 powerwise charger with 2 or 3 year old batteries? just curious what everyones ammeter goes to before charger shuts off, I am wondering if mine is shutting off at 10 amps because of a fault with the charger or batteries?

 

[HotRodCarts]

Start with doing individual battery voltage checks while the cart is charging near the end of the charge cycle. Then let the cart sit a hour or so and check voltages again. Post your results.

 

[dougmcp]

I don't have a Powerwise charger but the finishing charge is used to equalize the batteries and eliminate the sulfation, without that equalizing stage you will likely suffer a premature battery death.
At 50% your charger should run about 8 hours or so.
Sounds like you have a battery that will not come up to the level that will allow the charger to reduce it's amperage.
Like HRC said, post up the individual voltages of the batteries after a full charge and after a 15 mile run.

 

[chasenfish16]

Here they are at the end of a charge cycle:

#1= 7.37
#2= 7.38
#3= 7.44
#4= 7.38
#5= 7.39
#6= 7.49

Total pack=44.5

Charger again shutoff around 10 amps

I will post readings again in about 1 hour along with specific gravity readings.

 

[chasenfish16]

Here are the readings after 1 hour:

#1= 6.45
#2= 6.45
#3= 6.48
#4= 6.45
#5= 6.44
#6= 6.47

Total pack= 38.7

The specific gravity test was between 1.250-1.260 on all batteries and all cells.
I also completed a load test of all batteries with a manual 50 amp load tester and all of the passed with flying colors, the meter barely even moved on the gauge and stayed in the green.

I hope this info helps and someone can diagnose why my charger kicks off at 10 amps, I understand that the batteries are 2 years old and have some wear and tear and some of the readings may be a little low. But my main concern is with the charger kicking off at 10 amps it is not getting a finishing charge and it will hurt the batteries in the long run.

 

[dougmcp]

Batteries look to be in great shape, perhaps it is the meter on the charger that is not working properly or sticking. Try tapping the meter and see if the needle drops down. If not that then something is wrong with the charger (board).

 

[chasenfish16]

The meter drops to zero when it shuts off, so I do not believe that is it. What should the pack voltage be just prior to it shutting off? I have been checking the voltages regulary during charging and it seems that the charger shuts off about 15 minutes after it stops climbing at 44.5 everytime. Shouldn't the timer on the board tell it to run longer to get the finishing charge? I jumped the board and ran it for another 3 hours and it never went above 44.5 volts. My brother thinks I should run it manually for at least 6 hours to see if the volts climb and the ammeter goes down, does anyone see a problem with this logic?

 

[dougmcp]

My 42v charger runs about 54v at it's end cycle and a 48v charger runs about 61v so I assume a 36v charger should be in the area of about 46v.
I think I would try running it for the 6 hours like your brother suggests and see what happens. You can't really hurt the batteries.

 

[chasenfish16]

Thanks, I will give that a try. I will post the results.

 

[chasenfish16]

Does the controller board in the charger control the amperage output of the charger or is it dependent of the load of the batteries? (hope this makes sense) because when I jump the board it does not drop below 10 amps also in the past, just curious if the board tells it to drop amperage at a certain point.

 

[dougmcp]

I haven't looked into the schematics of the charger or the board but I would assume there is some sort of sensing circuit. It is probably done through a voltage sensing circuit on the board, as the voltages rises, the amperage drops.
If you can read a schematic, here is a typical charger circuit, not the Powerwise:

 

[chasenfish16]

This is driving me crazy, I jumped the controller board and ran it for about 4 hours after it would have normally kicked off at 10 amps. The really weird thing is that the ammeter started to climb to about 12 instead of going down at the 4 hour point. So I shut it off not wanting to damge the batteries. Does anyone an explanation for this? I wish I understood how the charger knows to start lowering the amperage during the charge cycle.

 

[cdrsavage]

I believe the condition of the batteries determine the amount of amperage drawn from the charger. As the batteries charge, the internal resistance goes up and the amperage drawn goes down. The control board only turns on/off a relay which switches the a.c. on to the transformer. Mind now, these boards are turned on by the existing battery voltage. if the batteries are run down to low, they will not turn on the control board. My tests show about 24 volts needed to initialize the control board. How the control boards actually work is a trade secret. one can only assume that they sense current draw and then go into a timing phase and then eventually shutdown the charge cycle. (turn of the a.c. relay) You can unplug the charger and replug it in immediately and it will again go into its shutdown cycle which is quite long, as stated, 1 - 2 hours. In conclusion, I believe you have a battery problem, most likely only one, so if you have access to at least one good battery, try switching one at a time to isolate the bad one.....luck

 

[Gale Hawkins]

Do you have a follow up on the final outcome/cause of your charger problem?