04 IQ wiring problem, possibly old batteries

[mtmax]

Hi guys, thanks for the great forum!

So, we have an 04 club car, 48v, serial #CQ0437..... , with a push lever f-n-r switch. It is exactly like 03CQ's golf cart, bought from the same TU course in Idaho. I would post a link to his thread, he has really nice pictures, but I am not that smart, as you will see in a second.

Last fall the amber indicator light near the steering column was flashing, indicating low battery. So I cleaned all the connections as they were a bit corroded, and when I hooked them back up, the red wire from the charging plug was I think hooked up wrong. It was hooked to the negative of one of the batteries, and after looking at a friends' same model cart, his was hooked to the positive (he bought his in the same place also). It sat all winter with the charger plugged in this way. As near as I can tell the charger never turned on, so the batt's must really be drawn down. Fast forward to yesterday. Go to use cart, no go. All right, let's check the wiring. Crap, red charging wire in wrong spot. Move to correct terminal (positive, first one in series on pass side). Try charger, doesn't turn on. Try cart, push go pedal,clicks gently on downstroke, no go forward or reverse. Try lights, yay!, nice and bright. Reverse warning buzzer nice and loud. Amber light still flashing. I did verify the plug to the charger was hot, and I did try my friend's charger, which we know works on his, and it also did not turn on. Water level good on all cells.

All right, you can beat me with your dummy sticks now. My plan is to go down today and test the voltages of the batteries each and at series end to see what they are, but I am not hoping for the best(I do have a voltage tester, but am no expert with it, hard to believe,huh). The other friend who has the exact same cart just had to put new batt's in his this spring. I am guessing that 7 years is about the life span of these batt's. I am hoping I did not ruin the charger, and if the batteries are still ok what a bonus!

A couple of questions
Did I ruin the charger? How about the batteries?
When checking each battery individually, is it best to unhook them from the series, or can I just go plus to minus on each one while still in series?
Is there a wiring diagram of the 04IQ (not that I could read it properly)?
Where do I go from here?
Any other thoughts or guidance would be greatly appreciated by this humble golf cart rookie. Sorry for the long post, I hope you can understand it. Here in Montana I am a long way from any dealers.

Max

[GLEEMO]

1. No the charger is OK.
2 Batteries may be too depleted to cause charger to come on (need to be at least 38 Volts.
3. Checking individually batteries with all connected is OK.

Get battery readings and entire pack reading's and post here , then we can decide what to do next

[shadowman]

the chargers have a low voltage sensor in them so if the batteries are below approx 36 volts the charger won,t come on.......your right the 10 gage red wire should be hooked to the pos side of #1 battery........1st thing is voltage readings than charge each one manully to bring them up.......you can bypass low voltage sensor but if your not sure we won,t go there........anyways do 1 battery at a time cables on or off its your call but get the battery voltage up and than plug charger in and let it finish till it shuts off and than we can find out if the batts. are any good.......your charger should be fine........so theres a start and post findings we,ll go from there.................

[GLEEMO]

PS: does cart have a external or internal charger ?

[mtmax]

Thanks for the replies Gleemo and shadowman.
The cart has the external charger, and the "rocker" type f-n-r.

I ran into town and checked. The batteries showed voltages from passenger side through the series of: 4.56, 4.52, 8.09, 8.11, 8.09, and 8.08. The total voltage was 23.5. I'm sure they went through the winter in this condition. Some of the connectors were pretty bad, so I will replace them. Any chance I can bring the two lowest batteries home and charge them as described in other posts here with my 12 volt charger (or all of them if needed), and try to revive them enough to get the system going?

Thanks again,
Max

[shadowman]

you can put a 12 volt charger on the low ones just don,t leave it on forever and don,t leave it out of your site...........you can also bypass the low voltage sensor in the charger and it will than come on..................

[mtmax]

Hi shadowman,
Thanks for the response. Another question if you don't mind. If you add up all the separate cells, is that ideally what the total for the series should be? For example, in my case the cells add up to a little over 40v, but the reading across the series was only 23v. Does this indicate the wiring or connections are poor, or do low batteries cause this? Should I be checking anything else at this point?
Appreciate yours and any help,
Max

[shadowman]

since i,m not a battery expert i can,t answer about adding up each cell you should be fine by just going by each battery and since charger won,t come on theres a good chance true reading is in the 23 volt range, as mentioned charge the low batts heck you can even throw the charger on the other batts for 20 minutes each but bottom line is you have to get the battery voltage up to start somewhere.......there are some good battery webites that you can link to from here and some members with good battery knowledge so if any reads this i,m sure they,ll jump in...........in the mean time start charging those batts..............................

[GLEEMO]

Look 4.56, 4.52, 8.09, 8.11, 8.09, and 8.08 = 41.5 Volts

This is enough to turn the charger ON,
my guess is U have a bad battery cable(s) or excessively dirty batteries.
Fix cables and crud on batteries then try charging again !