Hi,
I put in batteries in July and everything was working great until a couple of weeks ago. Right when the weather got a bit colder the batteries seemed to be at 85% of charge. The car was working great and always showed 100% charge on the meter with a slow normal loss. One day I turned the car on and it was at 100% but with a little movement quickly went to 85% and then seemed to lower normally after the 85% (if that makes sense). I tested voltage with a multimeter and took readings with a hydrometer and everything seemed good to go. All of the batteries read the same on the hydrometer at the high end of the “green” area. Do you think my temperature sensor on the zivan ng1 is giving false readings so the batteries aren’t charging fully or something like that? I just replaced it. I guess i should fully charge each battery with a trickle charger and then test?
One of my batteries was a little low on water a couple of weeks ago, whereas the other 5 were normal. It was also reading a little lower on voltage, however has since acted the same as the other batteries.
What is the best way to do a load test?
i will order a load tester i guess…
NAPA and most auto parts stores sell a hand held 12 volt load tester. These are not expensive. You said the charger was replaced. Was this a new charger? Is it set to “F” for charging flooded batteries. If you purchased a used charger, was it “micro upgraded”? Many batteries are sold with the month and year of manufacture stamped on them. Are your “new” batteries fresh? We bought two new GEMs that had batteries sitting for two years. They did not last long.
Daniel
i sent my charger to Zivan like 6 months ago. I told them to set it for flooded and told them the batteries i had in it. They didn’t put a switch on the charger like i thought they would do and they didn’t put the float feature on either…
Anyway, i got a load tester and a hydrometer…and all the batts tested on the high side of good. One battery does read .1 in voltage lower when i check voltage both after charging and after sitting a while. When i plug in a external charger to each battery they all read 95% after a full charge with the Zivan. The one suspect battery had a lower water level which i filled with distilled water a couple months ago, whereas all the others were fine. I am guessing the batt is causing the issues. When i drive the Gem it goes from 100 percent to 85 after putting load on it with the pedal. Then it goes down about twice as fast as it used to but I can still go pretty far until i get to 70%.
Run the GEM until the batteries are weak. Then load test them. Replace any that fail.
Daniel
i ran them till weak…around 55% left and load tested them all… 10 seconds each till tester was red hot…and all checked out fine lol
I ran the gem down to 50%… started this morning at 75% after a full charge the night before. i tested the charge on the batts with a trickle charger and it said they were full as well. I drove 9.4 miles (according to google) and the charge went from 75% to 50%. When i came back I load tested all the batteries and they all were in the middle of the “good” (green) area on my load tester. I went a little over 10 seconds on each.
Could I have some kind of power “leak”… I checked all connections and there doesn’t seem to be any corrosion and I made sure all the connections were tight as well. All of the batteries are at water capacity as well. They all tested good on the hydrometer… The only thing I can find is that 1 battery consistently reads .1 below in voltage from the other batteries. It is the first battery after the switch. The battery in the top portion of the front of the gem tests .1 higher than the rest as well… or .2 higher than the low one.
I don’t believe a current draw is your problem. Unless it is a huge current draw, it would not reduce the GEM’s range. Make sure that the charger is set to “F” for flooded batteries. It is also possible, although not likely, that all of the batteries have worn out at the same time. Are you sure the brakes are not dragging? This is a very common problem on the GEM.
Daniel
there is no setting for my charger…zivan didn’t put the switch on for some reason. It was charging fine for a few months though…the brakes wouldn’t have an impact of the batteries being at 75% each morning…The cart reaches 25 mph so i doubt there is premature breaking
i cleaned all the posts with battery cleaner and tightened them all down pretty tight. I went for a drive and it seemed to be a little better. I came back and retightened and ended up breaking the threaded post on one of the batteries (too tight)…can i attach that battery to the larger post or now do i have to convert all of the batteries to the large posts?..or do i need a new battery…
The battery can be saved. You can get a post adapter from any auto parts store. NAPA sells these as part # 7511031. Take a look:
NAPA battery adapter7511031
Your Zivan charger does have a selector switch. It may be covered by a small plug on the top of the unit. The red arrow in the image below indicates the location. Set to “F” for flooded. I believe your charger is undercharging the batteries.
Daniel
I put the connection directly to the main terminal like this…
http://www.electronicsnmore.com/images/Heavy%20Duty%20Universal%20Battery%20Terminal%20-%206%20to%202-0%20Gauge.gif
is that ok? or do i have to use the post?
[QUOTE=GEMmechanic;9895]The battery can be saved. You can get a post adapter from any auto parts store. NAPA sells these as part # 7511031. Take a look:
NAPA battery adapter7511031
Your Zivan charger does have a selector switch. It may be covered by a small plug on the top of the unit. The red arrow in the image below indicates the location. Set to “F” for flooded. I believe your charger is undercharging the batteries.
Daniel[/QUOTE]
attached are the pics of my charger… the pic shows that zivan punched out the trojan flooded portion of the sticker. There is however no switch on the charger.
Either way will work fine.
Daniel