I put a cheap Amazon lithium battery in my golf cart. How did it go?

I put a XRH lithium battery in my wife’s golf cart and man did it go awesome. Time will tell on the longevity but it sure is a good upgrade

[@pounch21]

Nice upgrade. I would love to see an update sometime down the road. I don't like the idea of kids around when working with voltages over 50v.

[@larryphillips4164]

Shhh the adults are talking…

[@jeffl4810]

Replace those resistor coils with a PWM motor control... Those resistors just waste precious electrical power, and complicate the electrical system. The high power wires are minimized with a PWM controller, and no contractors/switches needed for the high power wires, other then the safety switch/cutoff contactor. The motor controller just takes a signal from the accelerator petal, using simple wiring. You will get much better motor control, and better battery utilization. Edit: you mentioned towards the end about adding a motor controller 👍👍

[@tdchotrods9889]

Yup that will be a project for a later date. Thank you.

[@danielm2248]

Great video, I’ve wanted to upgrade my 91 club car to a lithium battery for a while now, but had many concerns. You covered all my questions. Thanks!

[@tdchotrods9889]

awesome I'm glad I could help

[@junkerzn7312]

10kW of power and 5kWh of storage. That is quite a lot of capability for a golf cart. A single battery is fine but you can also boost the power by putting two or more 48V batteries in parallel. Still, I think you made a good choice with the battery. There are no golf-cart-specific lithium batteries... its just marketing noise, but you already figured out that the only thing that really matters with respect to the golf cart is the BMS's surge capability. 2 AWG is a good choice for 48V @ 100A nominal and 200A surge. the losses will be very low. Of course, the resistor coil wastes an enormous amount of power (unfortunately), but there isn't a whole lot you can do about that without replacing a lot more motor-related parts. Note that if you have a voltage-based battery state-of-charge indicator, that won't work with LiFePO4. The discharge curve is very flat so you basically have to count amp-hours dispensed. Also, you said LIPO in your description but that's actually LiFePO4 (LFP). And in fact LiFePO4 is exactly what you want here. That battery will last forever.... 3000 cycles @ 80% depth-of-discharge will take it down to 80% of original capacity. You won't notice any degradation for years. Plus, LFP chemistry batteries basically don't fail... the capacity just goes down slowly over many years. The rest of the golf cart is gonna fall apart before the battery does. (The battery's BMS will fail before its cells do).

[@tdchotrods9889]

thanks for the comment that was some very awesome info! I appreciate it

[@mitchmain270]

This looks great. Can you share a link to the battery and charger setup that you used?

[@tdchotrods9889]

Thank you. I just tried to find it and looks like I bought the last one the others are on back order so it won’t pop the link up. But I bought it on Amazon.

[@pezjme]

You put the battery brand backwards in the description.

[@tdchotrods9889]

oops yep I did I will fix that thank you

[@DamonSipe]

Hey, great video man! Thanks! My club car is a little newer so I don't have the springs and all, but I was wondering how you handled reducing 48v down to 12v for lights and such? I'm getting ready to instal mine this weekend.

[@kurtschubler5972]

Just need an 48v to 12 reducer, I picked one from Ebay for $16 dollars.

[@DamonSipe]

@@kurtschubler5972 Thanks, that worked for me!

[@solardiyhobbyandrevies8118]

Need to get a solar panel up on the roof and charge all day long during the day.

[@tdchotrods9889]

yep, that's the plan

[@ericbennett1872]

You can tell your kid to put his tongue back in his mouth. But great video thanks for sharing.

[@tdchotrods9889]

Or not. And let him be a goofy kid when the camera is on.

[@ericbennett1872]

@@tdchotrods9889 Fair enough.

[@bigospig]

Any plan to put a solar panel on the roof to keep it charged up?

[@tdchotrods9889]

Yep I sure do.

[@junkerzn7312]

@@tdchotrods9889 Its a bit tough given the small roof area and the higher battery voltage. I recommend going with a "boost" charge controller in this situation. So: * "PowMR Boost Solar Charge Controller" ($35). * Either 2 x 75W solar panels OR 1 x 200W solar panel. Whichever fits the roof best. 2 x 75W in series ($81ea x 2 = $162). Newpoa mono 75W panel (x2). OR 1 x 200W ... Newpoa 9BB 200W 24V panel ($221). (NOTE: A single 200W panel has to have a VOC and Voperating voltage above 24V to work). -- I think the best bang for the buck will be if you use 2 x 75W panels, but check the dimensions to make sure that you can fit that on the roof. The total cost would be around $200 ($81 ea x 2 for the panels, and $35 for the PowMr boost controller). Plus misc 12 AWG wiring. The PowMR has a fairly tight voltage range to support your battery... the input voltage must be 25V to 48V. 2 x 75W panels fits the bill just about perfectly. Quite a few solar panel combinations won't work here. You have to make sure that the total solar voltage is 25V to 48V (both the open-circuit total voltage, and the operating total voltage must be in that range). There are other options... such as going with 4 x 50W panels to develop a SolarVoltage > BatteryVoltage+5V, and using a standard Buck charge controller like a Victron 100/20. But I think they wind up being more expensive and won't fit the roof well. -Matt

[@tdchotrods9889]

@@junkerzn7312 awesome info thank you!

[@jeffl4810]

Nice upgrade! But add a fuse to that battery. Unless that battery is internally current limited, if something fails/wire chafes through, you could have a very bad day. Wires can become so hot, they glow orange, and incinerate stuff near by. Fiberglass when it gets burning is notoriously flammable. There are relatively low cost terminal fuses ment to put on batteries. These are very simple to install. Optionally, a type T fuse mounted close to the battery, where a damaged wire can't harm anything, and the wire is double insulated (eg wire loom sheathing added). Some industries recommend the fuse be within 7" of the terminal, but common sense engineering principles apply here.

[@Getitstraightyo]

Kid is very poorly behaved. Distracts from the video. Parent him brother, boundaries are a good thing.