I’ve had my 2000 GEM for over two years now, and replaced the batteries sometime around April this year. Up until this point, everything had been working great in terms of range and performance.
Out of nowhere, the GEM has started acting erratically in terms of battery performance. We used to be able to drive from our home to the golf course, play a round of golf, and drive back and still have 55% remaining. Now we can’t make it home. We’ve actually had to push it back twice.
I’ve checked the connections and everything looks great. Tested each battery and all are above 12v while completely disconnected. The thing is, even after charging now the battery level meter only shows 85% at most. It doesn’t update much while driving. For example, usually when it shuts off it’s still above 50%. Additionally, if I turn it off and let it sit for a few minutes, even after completing shutting down and giving me an error code, when I turn it back on it’ll be above 25% according to the battery meter.
In my mind this can’t be a battery issue since everything checks out and they’re basically new. So, what else could it be? Is the controller just shorting out and giving incorrect readings? If so, is there a way to reset it? Any advice would be helpful.
I think one of your new battery’s has a problem. Have them load checked
Can I perform this myself? I’d rather not take all six batteries out and haul them around.
If so, what kind of load tester would I need in terms of amps?
Ok, so I hooked up my volt tester to each battery and took off in road mode. Each battery dropped from 12 to 10-ish on takeoff. One battery dropped from 12 to 5. That must be the bad battery?
When you replaced the battery’s, did you replace them with the same kind? Flooded , Gel’s, AGM?
Yes, they are flooded. They worked great for the first four months. This problem just kind of popped up.
I pulled the suspected faulty battery and brought it back to the store. They told me it was only at 40% charge, so they would charge it overnight and then load test. Everything appeared fine the next day.
I put the battery back into the cart, charged it overnight, and it still is only showing 75% charge. I’m not exactly sure what to do next. I don’t want to pull all of the other five batteries and haul them in to get tested, so I was considering picking up a charger myself and charge each battery separately. Any recommendations (Amazon, preferably).
Were the batteries you took out flooded or Gel?
Gel setting is not aggressive enough for flooded battery’s and will reduce range by half in 6 months.
I had to get a set of Floodeds “Reconditioned” because I didn’t know this. Dealer had them on his magic desulfator for a week.
I replaced flooded with flooded.
Did you jack up each corner and check for dragging brake?
After an 8 hour charge and a 2 hour reast you might want to check battery voltage to verify charger performance.
Brand, model # and size of the new batteries. If you Have a Delta q charger is it set on 13?
There is one great advantage of having flooded batteries. You can check each individual cell with a hydrometer. Probably the best 7 bucks you can spend.
A battery can show good with a volt meter but still have a bad cell that can cause operational problems.
You have young batteries. Checking an hour after charging should show all cells in the 12.65-13.00 range. If they aren’t your charger is not set on the right algorithm or is defective.
If you have a low reading on 1 cell and the others match you have a bad battery.
That’s very helpful. I’ll pick one up today and give it a go.
Tested every battery and cell with the hydrometer. The one battery I brought back to the store, which was manually recharged there, had every cell above 1.275. The rest of the batteries, which were only charged via the GEM’s charger, were below 1.250. None were drastically lower than the others. This was after a full charge via the GEM’s charger.
So, it seems like the GEM’s charger isn’t fully charging every battery for some reason. I’ve included a photo of the charger for reference. It’s set to “F” and I’ve never changed that since I replaced the Trojan flooded batteries with these.
Here’s a photo of what the charger is set to.
Hmmm
12.35 to 12.50 is what you might see if charged on a gel setting.
The cord is masking the information on the lable. What is the middle setting? Try that setting for 8 hours. Flooded batteries have to be charged at a high enough rate to stir the electrolyte. You should see bubbles. If you have a volt meter, on the bank, when charging you will see voltage in the mid 90’s prior to shut off.
Rodney
Rodney
It shows PRC. Any chance switching the setting could do damage to the batteries? If not, I’m willing to give it a go.
PRC is a setting that I’m not familiar with.
It says 90 volts which tells me flooded but I never heard of it.
Call Zivan and find out and come back and tell us.
Flooded batteries are tough I would have no problem giving it a shot. Drive the cart a bit to drain the batteries a bit first.
Rodney
I plugged it in on the PRC setting and it charged for maybe a few minutes and then went into the cool down mode. The meter is now showing 100% even though I just tested the batteries and proved otherwise.
I guess I’ll drive it a bit, plug it in again on the PRC setting, and see what happens.