Any experience with new EZ GO lithium carts?

[BobBoyce]

Originally Posted by JohnnieB

The lighter weight of the battery pack, effectively lowers the center of gravity and the last time I checked, lowing the center of gravity makes the vehicle less likely to tip over.

I noticed this when I converted my RXV to lithium. Dropped the RXVs weight by over 500 Lbs.

[nickdalzell1]

I'm still expecting to read news articles about exploding lithium packs in these cars, which, if I am not too mistaken, is far more volatile and violent than a simple battery explosion in a lead-acid system..

To say nothing about how this is probably more complicated and needs far more electronics to monitor the packs of a lithium car making them far more likely for failure (or user error especially those who attempt repair when they know not what they are doing) than the infamous e-brake issue with the RXV. We all know 'that guy' who had a battery explode in his face because the wrench went too close to the terminals as he was messing around, how worse will an exploding lithium battery end up being? I shudder to think about it.

I'll leave a quote from the Timeless episode of Star Trek:Voyager:

"The theory is sound, but there are too many variables"

[BobBoyce]

Originally Posted by jkredman

I wonder what they will charge if we want to use this package as an upgrade for an older cart?

The 665954 battery’s don’t appear to be orderable yet

(Not that I’m in any hurry...)

I was on the phone with E-Z-GO yesterday. I was told they are transitioning to more and more parts being E-Z-GO Dealer parts only. And that parts will be available by having an authorized E-Z-GO Dealer order it for you.

[Cartmaster]

Originally Posted by JohnnieB

The lighter weight of the battery pack, effectively lowers the center of gravity and the last time I checked, lowering the center of gravity makes the vehicle less likely to tip over.

JohnnieB. Can i quote you on this if the question comes up again? I tried to dispel the rumour with our company and that is why our purchase manager decided to have a Demo and tried hard to tip one over therfore proving the rumour to be false. I also heard yesterday that a Rep from one of the other "reputable" dealerships was spreading the rumour and his own company have now taken him off the sales team. Obviously, in the UK we have not seen many fleets being taken on with Lithium power and hence why i asked some questions here for a more global opinion. I firmly beleive that these carts will perform fine for us and hopefully will prevent a lot of "battery issues" that we see on poorly maintained Lead acid batteries.

Originally Posted by nickdalzell1

Starting to really hate EZGO lately with all this change for change's sake. First the Disposable Powerwise QE, then RXV then the 'thumper' engine now this....

Club Car and Yamaha are getting my business back real soon.

EZGO will realize too late what happens when cars start exploding on folks like Galaxy Note 7's.

I agree with some of this, particularly the engine which can be a pain to work on. The RXV although innovative, i did not feel was good for fleet use for various reasons like the e brake failures etc. But regarding battery explosions, we will have to wait and see what happens. I have heard and seen many instances of L/A batteries exploding. Not just on carts either. It will bean interesting few years LOL.
The long warranty on the Lithium batteries is a bonus and i am sure that i read an article that stated the testing period by EZGO was extensive and over a fair time period.

If all goes well our new fleet should be here in a month or so and i will certainly be reporting my findings. The only down side is that i think our company have decided to hire the fleet this time rather than purchase, so i will not have as much interaction with them for the next three years.

[DaveTM]

BTW......they did fix the exploding issue on the Galaxy 7 cell phone.

[nickdalzell1]

Yeah, by recalling the entire line and later releasing the Galaxy Note 8. But it shows how volatile the nature of Lithium batteries can be. Any imbalance between cells (aka one bad battery) can cause disastrous results.

They don't even allow lithium batteries on planes after the Dreamliner fiasco. Lithium batteries are volatile enough on electronic devices and I am not too certain I would trust them to work reliably or safely on a golf car. Remember the hoverboard fires?

Personally I would rather see cell phones and computers go back to NiMH myself. safer.

[BobBoyce]

Originally Posted by nickdalzell1

Yeah, by recalling the entire line and later releasing the Galaxy Note 8. But it shows how volatile the nature of Lithium batteries can be. Any imbalance between cells (aka one bad battery) can cause disastrous results.

They don't even allow lithium batteries on planes after the Dreamliner fiasco. Lithium batteries are volatile enough on electronic devices and I am not too certain I would trust them to work reliably or safely on a golf car. Remember the hoverboard fires?

Personally I would rather see cell phones and computers go back to NiMH myself. safer.

The lithium cells that have had those issues were using Cobalt as a part of their chemistry. Currently, the Tesla packs and the Chevy Volt packs are still using cobalt, the Nissan Leaf packs are not. The issue was related to whiskers growing in the cells at high State of Charge, puncturing the seperators between the electrodes. If you keep lithium cells with Cobalt in the chemistry, at or below 90% SOC, they are not as likely to suffer a catastrophic failure, unless they are physically damaged from outside forces..

I personally will not use any lithium cells that contain cobalt, it's not worth the risk to me. I was very cozy with Tesla more than 7 years ago, and did some design work for them. When I was asked to become involved with their charger design, I refused. I wanted no affiliation with a company that puts corporate profits ahead of consumer safety. They were aware of the dangers of their choice of battery chemistry, but it was the only way that they could reach their range goal, within their budget per vehicle.

[nickdalzell1]

"Physically damaged from outside forces"

Golf cars fit this bill quite often, at least, given what heaps roll in for repair around here.

Just seems to be a recipe for disaster if you ask me. One charger failure, too much heat, a jacked up motor or lift kit, abuse in general, just too much can go wrong.

Oh, and I am well aware of the horror stories associated with super cheap (sub-$7000) Teslas on Craigslist.

[BobBoyce]

Originally Posted by nickdalzell1

"Physically damaged from outside forces"

Golf cars fit this bill quite often, at least, given what heaps roll in for repair around here.

Just seems to be a recipe for disaster if you ask me. One charger failure, too much heat, a jacked up motor or lift kit, abuse in general, just too much can go wrong.

Oh, and I am well aware of the horror stories associated with super cheap (sub-$7000) Teslas on Craigslist.

If the pack is securely mounted under the center of the seat area, it should be fairly safe from damage. The Nissan Leaf modules were tested to destruction with a torch by Nick of EVBatteryCenter, just to see if he could cause a cascading failure. That pretty much proved that the cells in the module were not like the Cobalt containing lithium cells.

[HarryT]

We had a test cart delivered yesterday. I got a chance to test it today. It is an Elite RXV. It is programmed for 12 MPH on level ground according to my GPS. That is a little slower than our 2015 CC's that run at around 13 MPH on level ground but it does not slow down on hills. We have really steep hills on our course in the Carolina mountains but it runs uphill at 12 MPH. That is a great improvement over our CC's that slowed down to 7 MPH on the same hills. Our Pro used it yesterday for a couple of hours and did one round today. When he came back I ran it for an hour or so testing it. I plugged it in tonight when I left and the charger was only down one dot on the LED''s. I only work two days a week so I will do more tests on Monday. I want to see how many rounds of the course it will make before running down. Our CC's would easily make 2 rounds but got a little tired on round 3 particularly on the steep hills.
On a quick look of the suspension and running gear it looks good but I did not see Zerk fittings on the kingpins yet.
I will let you all know more as I find out more.
Harry