Charging / breaking in new batteries?

cdees_1993

I just installed 4 new 12 v batteries in my club car precedent 06 model. How should I break them in? Run it down then charge back or put on charge immediately after each use? Please give reasoning with your answers.

Thanks for your help!

BGW

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jakesnake27

http://www.buggiesgonewild.com/elect...ery-guide.html

SaltLifeCC

Yeh cdees, this process is well documented in the stickies section. I also just bought a new set a few weeks back and am trying to break them in properly. I don't have an onboard meter on my cart so I check them with a handheld and when they get down to about 49.8 volts, I plug it in. Don't forget to keep an eye on your water levels as well, not just during breakin, but always.

Park and plug method is for maintaining batteries after breakin. During breakin, you want to run them down to a consistent level before recharging. The reasoning for this should be obvious when you read the stickies.

scottyb

http://cartsunlimited.net/Battery_Break-in_Methods.html

LOts of good reading easily found with a little search, basically you do do not want to deep discharge and you should be doing lots of shallow discharge and recharge cycles.

Recharge after use.

Speedchaser

What Scotty said, he know bats for sure.
Just plug it in after each use, leaving bats partially discharged causes buildup on the plates that will shorten bat life and weaken them.

SaltLifeCC

Not going to question Scotty - so have to question why we sticky opposing methods and why, when I bought my batteries, the dealer gave me a sheet of break-in instructions that are so similar to those opposing methods. I've seen methods that say run down to 75% and others that say 50% but they all agree to run down to a given level before recharging for 10 to 20 cycles before going to the park and plug method.

Speedchaser

Hey salt, tell me why because i have not heard that. The batteries do not have memory. Interested in why one would want to leave a partially discharged battery pack, say at 90 % and lets say for a week only because the new bats need to be discharge at least to 80% before recharging. Is this what you are saying?

SaltLifeCC

That's what I am saying. And I can't tell you why - I'm just the messenger. There are plenty of posts around here that promote that method. I'm sure, ideally, you'd want to unplug the cart, run it down to the prescribed level as soon as possible, and plug it back in. As opposed to unplugging it, riding down the block and back, and plug it back in. You say the batteries don't have memory but this method sure seems to be based on some sort of memory conditioning. I can't find the sheet the dealer gave me but it talked about doing this to maximize run times, battery longevity, and even lessen charge times to as little as 5 or 6 hours.

Speed, click the guide link that Jakesnake posted and open the pdf and read the first page. That procedure is basically the same that my dealer gave me except their sheet says run down to 75% rather than 50%.

jakesnake27

Would someone please tell me what this means? I have seen it before a few times. Does it mean the batteries do not hold their charge if not left on a charger, or does it mean the batteries don't care how many times they are recharged?

SaltLifeCC

Battery memory, for batteries that are susceptible to it, is when you recharge batteries too often and they "learn" a much shallower bottom point than they should. So you would have a shorter runtime after a period of time of charging too often. The best example I could give you are the older types of cordless phone handset batteries. People would talk on them and then put them back on the cradle and do that long enough and you find that when you need to talk longer, they no longer last as long as you'd like or should. I don't think cart batteries develop these hard stop memories quite like that but, according to at least the sources discussed in this thread, there is something to them where conditioning them (breaking in) to a certain level of discharge before recharging them, at least 10 cycles or more, is believed to maximize their performance while reducing the time they take to charge.

Scottyb certainly knows his stuff, so when he says just ride, park, and plug from day 1, that's why this discussion has taken off. I've seen other posts support this method as well but I never paid any attention to them because they didn't come from someone like Scotty.

I guess another example I could give on battery memory would be a gas powered engine for example. Let's say it holds 20 gallons of gas, but you repeatedly fill it up everytime you use 5 gallons. Then one day it starts running out of gas when you've used only 5 gallons, even though you know there are 15 gallons left in the tank. An unrealistic example, but I think it illustrates the point.