While my Gem was charging, my daughter unplugged our Gem improperly. Instead of unplugging from the wall first, she unplugged from the cart itself. There was a short of some sort that occurred, because I could smell that familiar smell of fried electronics, and now it’s a complete paperweight. When plugged in it does nothing.
Any suggestions??
Thank for for the help.
I unplug our 2002 at the cart all the time without any issues. Have you confirmed that the circuit is still hot, could you have blown a breaker?
One place that maybe an issue is the power cord female plug, I have had arcing there especially if it’s not firmly pushed onto the cart’s socket.
O.M.G… you did not let her get away with that did you? She could have damaged something important, like grandma’s portable dialysis machine, or aunt Gurtie’s portable margarita maker, doing that
Damn kids these days.
I swear I have unplugged this way before without issue, but this time something definitely happened.
I did check my breaker box and the extension cord I use to charge it. Both seem issue free. I am getting power to the plug, and it does charge other electrical items.
Are there any electrical tests that I can run to identify where the issue is? I’m concerned we fried our cart.
It shouldn’t matter which end you unplug, the result is the same.
The issue is when connections start to wear, oxidize, corrode, or get dirty things start to get a little dicey. If you add a little bit of water it makes for even more crackly fun.
Plugging in isn’t such an event since the charger has a lag time as it goes through it’s boot cycle on power up. The worst of it happens when the charger is under load and pulling max amps. These connections were not really made to be broken when under load. It is far better to somehow shut off the power to the charger before unplugging (but who does that) or wait till it is fully charged (demand current is low).
Things to check
Since you just checked your input cord and power from the wall, let’s move on to the car.
What does your socket on the car look like? Make sure your pins are all there, not all fried, black and the base is not melted from heat.
Inspect the cord as it comes out the back. Follow the cord as it snakes around and goes to the charger. Look for anything out of the ordinary. Later cars have a junction/plug in the hardness so if you need to swap out a charger there is no need for wiring.
Use your nose. You said you actually smelled fried electrics. There is a difference between arc from the plug (ozone) and a component that may have let out it’s smoke. This hangs out a while. Give a sniff to your charger. It’ll probably be obvious.
Our 2001/02 has a junction plug on harness so the charger can use its power cord. From the external connection it is really just a short extension cord.
First of all, thank you all for responding and giving suggestions. Second, I apologize for the delay. Life got crazy…
Here is the update:
I inspected the plug, harness and fuses but didn’t see anything that caught my attention. I am attaching images of what I can see.
I can definitely say it was unplugged improperly under full load. If I replace charging unit will it get me back to life? I have the old charging unit.
Thank you so much for you help gentlemen.
As long as it’s out inspect the iec C-14 plug and plug it into an outlet.
I’m not sure if I understand, where is that plug located?
Sorry I’m still a little new to these.
The short a.c. cord on the charger. Use a computer cord to see if charger boots.
Wait… you actually took my post seriously? I thought it was facetious enough to be obvious,
There is no gem charger that I am aware of that has a mandatory shutdown sequence before unplugging.
Furthermore, the difference between unplugging at the wall or the cart is irrelevant. That’s why it’s called an extension cord.
If your charger let the blue smoke out on an unplug, it wouldn’t have mattered where the circuit break occurred. The charger’s number was up.
Now, I could tell you stories about the 440-480V & 600V 3ph equipment I’ve worked on and what happens when you zig when you should have zagged on a hot splice or d/c but that’s sea stories for another day. Thank god we never had an accident with 4160…
… But 120v, nach…
My electrician buddy stationed in Germany thought it a good idea to test primary in a vault with a wiggy on a stick. He was smart enough to let someone else do it.
Dave, did he live through that stunt?
Oh, wait re read, he had someone else do it.
Vaporized the wiggy eh?
Well, he told me the story.
They never found the wiggy Took off like a rocket.
Don’t know the details, but assume no ground. A wiggy lead to each phase maybe.
I shouldn’t be laughing but I am… Glad no one got hurt I hope
Do you know where your charger is? Most likely it is under the dash.
Follow the cord that comes out of it.
Does it have one of these?
If so, unplug this connection and bring in power with a computer cord. This bypasses the car cord up to this point.
Otherwise, Sniff the charger and see if you detect an odor of smoked electrical components.
If you are handy with basic tools, dismount the charger from the car. If you can figure out how to open it, there is a fuse inside the charger you can check as a last hail mary. But usually there is a reason the fuse blew. Something is not happy in there.
Disclaimer- This is not the job for someone not comfortable with board level service. Watch what you touch.
