Just got a modified 48 volt 2002 EZGO TXT Got it going but have a few Questions

[gtatransam]

Thanks for taking time to read, This forum has been very helpful with all my other problems and I'll try to be as descriptive as possible.

I received the cart in non running condition after it sat for around six years and here is what I know about it after looking it over

Lift kit with 22 inch A/T Tires
Rear seat kit with heavy duty bed
Alltrax AXE 4845 Controller
White rodgers 48 volt solenoid
D&D 170-004-0001 High torque motor
Batteries were 8 (2 in the bag well) 6volt Tojan and one 12volt battery for lights
On board Genius 4 bank 40 amp (10a per bank) charger

After looking everything Over I found that one of the terminals on the battery in the bag well were melted off and the wire was laid next to the battery. The wires used for the rear batteries were 4 foot 4 gauge cables. was that the cause for failure? Someone had since reconfigured the cart to run on 36 volts after it cooked the terminal.

So not needing anything High performance and not knowing much about carts I had opted to just Run it on 36 volts. I purchased 6 new 6 volt batteries and it fired right up and everything seems to be in working order. I heard the solenoid was clicking on with the key and found the micro switch for the pedal had gone bad and been bypassed. Safety is a big concern of mine so my wife and kids can operate it without any problems. After leaving the key on myself a few times I quickly replaced the foot switch.

So the cart seems to be ok now but before I use it to much I want to make sure I don't need to change anything to continue to run it on 36v with it being setup for 48. would I need a 36 v solenoid and smaller pre charge resister? I have the serial cable and I'm able to make any changes with the controller.

With that said It performs OK for what we need it for but our place has lots of steep hills and it gets pretty slow trying to turn those big tires so I'm considering stepping it back up to 48 but want to know how to do that safely without burning up another battery. I was thinking I could remove the 12 volt accessory battery under the seat and put on there and buy an actual battery box and put one batter in the bag holder with the shortest possible run using 2 gauge wire. I also Understand I will need a converter for my 12 volt stuff and I'm ok with that.

Is there a way to enable some sort of motor brake system? I tried turning on the plug brake and setting the braking in the alltrax contoller to 100% and it had no effect. The hills around here require tons of brake pressure to keep it from running away. I'm sure the brakes could be better but I'll attack that problem when I know the electronics are sorted.

The last problem I'm having is in reverse. Its super slow. Alltrax controller does not have the 1/2 throttle reverse feature enabled but is also only reading 28% in reverse with the pedal on the floor. It does read 100% While in the forward position.

Sorry for the long post. I'm trying to be as detailed in descriptive as possible in one shot.

[JohnnieB]

With a D&D High Torque motor, you should have 2Ga cables throughout. There are either 13 or 14 cables in a 6X6V or 6X8V system and 2 more in a 8X6V system.

Unless the AXE's model number has a "P" suffix, it doesn't have plug braking.

The 22" tall tires are costing you 18% of the available torque where rubber meets road and if the A/T tires are the low pressure type (Less than 10 PSI max inflation pressure) even more torque is lost.

Running at 48V will give your 33% more torque (and speed) than 36V.

Try disconnecting the orange wire and see if reverse works better.

[gtatransam]

Originally Posted by JohnnieB

With a D&D High Torque motor, you should have 2Ga cables throughout. There are either 13 or 14 cables in a 6X6V or 6X8V system and 2 more in a 8X6V system.

Unless the AXE's model number has a "P" suffix, it doesn't have plug braking.

The 22" tall tires are costing you 18% of the available torque where rubber meets road and if the A/T tires are the low pressure type (Less than 10 PSI max inflation pressure) even more torque is lost.

Running at 48V will give your 33% more torque (and speed) than 36V.

Try disconnecting the orange wire and see if reverse works better.

Thank you so much for the reply!

Cart has the factory 4 gauge wires. Need to change them to 2 even running on 36 volts? Other than that are we ok to leave everything else as is to keep running 36v?

I can't find a P anywhere but it had the extra terminal on the controller for the plug braking. Oh well thats ok thanks for the info.

I wish it didn't have these big 22 inch tires. They are flat spotted from sitting flat and I need to replace them anyway. I'm afraid to go smaller because if the big lift kit it might look pretty silly. I'll steer clear of the low pressure tires for sure.

I disconnected the Orange wire. It worked! Bad news is I did a reverse burn out in my uphill driveway when it threw me into the pedal. I then tried to program the 1/2 speed reverse into the alltrax with the Orange wire disconnected with no luck. Is there a happy median?

[mgray70]

Originally Posted by gtatransam

Thank you so much for the reply!



Cart has the factory 4 gauge wires. Need to change them to 2 even running on 36 volts? Other than that are we ok to leave everything else as is to keep running 36v?



I can't find a P anywhere but it had the extra terminal on the controller for the plug braking. Oh well thats ok thanks for the info.



I wish it didn't have these big 22 inch tires. They are flat spotted from sitting flat and I need to replace them anyway. I'm afraid to go smaller because if the big lift kit it might look pretty silly. I'll steer clear of the low pressure tires for sure.



I disconnected the Orange wire. It worked! Bad news is I did a reverse burn out in my uphill driveway when it threw me into the pedal. I then tried to program the 1/2 speed reverse into the alltrax with the Orange wire disconnected with no luck. Is there a happy median?

The system will draw more amps at 36 volt vs 48 volts, so yes cable upgrade is needed. Adjusting the reverse throttle is irrelevant once the orange wire is disconnected. That gives you automatic 100% reverse. You can try connecting it back and then adjusting the throttle percentage.

Sent from my SM-G970U using Tapatalk

[JohnnieB]

As mgray70 said, a 36V system draws more amps than a 48V system. In a nutshell, it takes the same number of Watts for the same cart to climb the same hill with the same load and Watts = Volts X Amps. So if it takes 3.6kW to climb a steep hill with 4 people onboard, the motor will draw 100A at 36V and 75A at 48V.

Not sure why throttle only goes to 28% when orange wire is connected and 1/2 speed box isn't checked.

Maybe contacting Alltrax will get an answer to that question.

---------------
If it was mine, I'd replace the AXE with a SR48500 and get 2 more 6V batteries.
The SR is much more user friendly than the AXE was and about 30 years new technology.

[gtatransam]

I think I'm going to just buy 2 more batteries and go back to a 48 volt system. Hopefully that will give me enough reverse power and more capacity than I'll ever need. I may even just put in a switch on the dash that disconnects the orange wire for sticky situations where you might need full reverse power.

Final question. Is there a reason nobody uses the 4 bank charger like I have? I can't find anyone else that uses that setup. Its a 12v charger charging two batteries per bank at 10 amps seems to work really well unless I'm missing something.

Thanks again for your time.

[JohnnieB]

As for the charger. The batteries are discharged in series, so they are typically charged in series to maintain better pack balancing, but if the 2S4P charging scheme keeps them all equally charged it ought to be okay.

10A is a bit puny for 225AH (or so) batteries, but if they reach full charge overnight it is adequate.

Check the individual battery voltages periodically, maybe same time you check the electrolyte levels. All 8 ought to be within about 0.1V of each other after about 12 hours after charging stops.