12 Volt Battery Life

[Down South]

I ride a couple hrs per day almost everyday. I burn lights about half that time just riding around the RV park that I stay in with no problems. I put the cart back on charge after every day of riding.

On topic, I'm thinking about getting a converter for my lights. From what I understand my lights are running off of #4 battery and that may cause #4 battery to go out faster.

[Stevec3201]

Originally Posted by Down South

I ride a couple hrs per day almost everyday. I burn lights about half that time just riding around the RV park that I stay in with no problems. I put the cart back on charge after every day of riding.

On topic, I'm thinking about getting a converter for my lights. From what I understand my lights are running off of #4 battery and that may cause #4 battery to go out faster.

Hi, This may be a good time for a little debate. But, before we start, what cart do you have?

My cart's lights are like yours and use the #4 for 12 volts. With that said, It seems to me that # 4 discharges more and thus requires more charge time. This addtional charge time on #4 is fine, but it overcharges #1, #2, #3. Is my logic correct? The over charging on 3 of the 4 batteries will decrease the life span of those batteries and make them weaker and force #4 to work harder. Does any of this make sense? So in a nutshell, not using a converter is bad for all batteries, not just #4. In my case, (like yours) it was #4 that went bad first, but they all were pretty much shot anyway.

I just orderd a converter, but I'm going to cancel that one and get a 25-30 amp converter. I did some more research and decided that I will need more amps than 10 What was I thinking

[trigger1937]

When I posted the usage of my cart and the 12 volt batteries I forgot a VERY important usage,..so I will be in the doghouse for another week. Anyway, I forgot to mention that my wife also plays golf twice a week,... So basically the golf cart gets used everyday. Some other useful information about usage. I have a lot of friends here in our Golf Course community and in 2002 our General Manager made a deal with "Pathminder" and purchased 225 new Club Car DS golf carts with 8volt trojans. These were actually paid for by each person that signed up for them. It was a great deal for all of our golf club membership and at a great price. Anyway they are all still running fine and most all of them have replaced their batteries either last year or early this year. So the batteries lasted about 8 years and were used about the same as my usage since I'm in the same golf group. Last year I played 88 days and my wife played 50 days. Some members in my group played over 100 days. We live in the foothills of the Sierras so we can play all year long depending on the weather. It does snow here once or twice a year but we have weather in the 30's to 60's for November through April so I don't play unless it is a really good day.

[Down South]

Originally Posted by Stevec3201

Hi, This may be a good time for a little debate. But, before we start, what cart do you have?

My cart is a 07 CC Precedent W/4-12V batteries. I've been lurking here mostly and posting very little. From what I have gathered out of many threads is, if we utilize #4 battery for lights or whatever, that battery appears to fail first.
I do plan on installing a radio/stereo system later plus a cigarette lighter plug so I'm thinking a converter will better fit my needs where it draws juice off of the whole battery pack instead of just battery #4.