Buying a used cart, how can I test batteries?

[SaltLifeCC]

It's probably not very feasible to do an in depth battery check when you just go out to a seller to look at a used cart. A DVM is something you're going to want anyway for a cart, so go anywhere that sells them and pick one up. I've got the Walmart version referred to and it works fine for my purposes. The more money you spend, the nicer you will get but you really just need something to check DC voltage. I think auto parts stores sell them too and you should find a better hydrometer there than you would at Walmart.

If there is a bad battery or a bad cell, it should be spotted with the hydrometer. I found out the hard way, that you can also find a bad battery with a DVM. My cart had a bad one when I bought it. But the pack would charge up fully and show proper voltage at first. But let it sit for a while, or better yet, ride it for a short period of time, and go back and check and the voltage dropped on the pack way too much, too soon, and then I isolated it to a single battery dropping way more than the others, way faster. Fortunately, the guy I bought it from was willing to swap it out for a good one for me.

[littlebob]

It helps if you have a hill near by. You can remove the seat and compare the voltages of each battery, by using a DVM, with the load of going up the hill. The 12v batteries in that year range of Precedents seem to be short lived compared to the 6v and 8v we see.