Solar charging a golf cart?

Back_40

Senior Member
My landowner is interested in leaving a golf cart on his property. There is no power line availability. I was just curious if solar is an option from him. Most youtube videos have the panels mounted on the roof but bouncing down logging roads doesn't sound compatible. So we would need mount the panels stationary and hope no one sreals them.
 

transfixer

Senior Member
I don't think that is feasible, I'm thinking you'd have to have a rather large solar panel setup to actually charge all the batteries up, and it would probably take forever and a day to do it, if it is possible ? best place for this question is on buggiesunlimited forum, there are a lot of Golf cart gurus over there, and I'm sure its already been done, or tried, I have a 48volt cart I use on the hunting lease, if I stay for more than 3 days I need to charge it to keep going, so I just picked up a small 2300watt inverter/generator and use it to power the charger, even then it will take 5 or 6 hours to top off the batteries if they were 50% discharged when I start charging.

There is an electric cart section on buggiesunlimited's site, seperate sections for EZGO and Club Car, they'll want to know what year and model it is probably, and whether 36 or 48volt, but like i said, someone over there has probably already tried it,, or at least attempted it.
 

AceOfTheBase

Senior Member
Agree, its problematic, like every time the cart is parked, the panels need to face the sun (perpendicular). On cloudy/rainy days, don't go far !!

Here's a 48 volt kit, that is a start: Golf cart Solar kit
 

transfixer

Senior Member
Correction to my earlier post, its buggiesgonewild forum site that I was talking about, I think the other one I mentioned is just a vendor there .
 

livinoutdoors

Goatherding Non-socialist Bohemian Luddite
You can do this fairly easily if you arent trying to have the solar panels mounted on the cart.
1. What voltage is the cart operating at.
2. How many amp hours is the battery bank total.
3. Then you can figure out how many solar panels you need to charge it at a resonable rate. All you need are some panels and a charge controller.
 

transfixer

Senior Member
Going back to the original post, don't know about the setup on the property, but keep in mind thieves like to steal batteries for scrap, unless its in a locked building , leaving it on an unattended property is a bit risky I would think, add to that the hassle and obviously the cost involved in a solar system big enough to accomplish charging, I think a small generator capable of running the golf cart charger makes more sense, although there are some aftermarket chargers that only output 5amps, and they will charge a golf cart, but they take days instead of hours to fully charge one.
 
Top