Goodyear Golf Cart Repair Golf cart sat all summer and will not start: what is recoverable and what is not
This is one of the most common calls we take every October. PebbleCreek, Estrella, and the other Southwest Valley communities empty out for the hottest five months of the year, and a lot of carts go into a closed cart barn in May and do not come out until the weather breaks in the fall. The question is always the same: is the pack recoverable, or is it $1,200 to $1,800 for a new one? The honest answer depends on the state of charge when it went into storage, and the only way to know is a proper charge attempt followed by a load test. We do that before anyone buys batteries.
Check this first (fifteen minutes)
- Read the pack voltage. A 48V pack at 40 volts or above has a real chance. A pack at 30 volts has been sitting flat for months and the odds are worse.
- Try the charger and watch it. If it starts and runs, leave it. If it does nothing, the pack is probably below its start threshold, which is not the same as the charger being dead.
- Pull a cell cap. Plates visible above the electrolyte means water was lost through the summer, and the exposed plate area is not coming back.
- Look at the terminals. A summer of heat and monsoon dust in a cart barn grows corrosion. Clean it before drawing conclusions about the pack.
- Check the tow/run switch and the tires. A cart that sat often has one flat or dry-rotted tire and a switch somebody bumped while cleaning. Neither is a battery problem.
What is usually going on
| What you observe | Likely cause | Fix and cost |
|---|---|---|
| Charger will not start, pack low but not flat | Below charger threshold | Bring-up on the visit, then load test |
| Charger starts, pack comes up, holds | Self-discharge only | Terminal service, tune-up $100 to $200 |
| Pack comes up, collapses under load | Sulfation | Pack $1,200 to $1,800 |
| One battery will not take charge | Failed cell | Single battery on a young pack, otherwise pack |
| Cart charges, clicks, will not move | Corroded cable or solenoid | See clicks but will not move |
| Tires flat, sidewalls cracked | Sat in the sun for months | Tires $75 to $150 each |
Prices from the pricing page; the $50 to $100 service call comes off the repair.
Why a Goodyear summer is uniquely hard on a parked cart
Two facts from NOAA’s Phoenix Sky Harbor normals explain it. The station counts 111.3 days a year at 100°F or above, with a July average high of 106.5°F, and it sees essentially no rain from May through June before the monsoon arrives in force.
Heat raises a lead-acid battery’s self-discharge rate, so a pack loses charge faster sitting in a hot cart barn than in a cool one. As the charge drops, lead sulfate crystals form on the plates; that is normal, and a charger reverses it if it happens soon. Left for months in triple-digit heat, the crystals harden and the charger cannot break them down. That is sulfation, and it is permanent capacity loss. Heat also evaporates water from the cells faster than almost anywhere else in the country, and once the plates are exposed they sulfate in air on top of everything else. A cart parked in May at 80 percent charge and collected in October has spent the five hottest months of the year doing the worst thing a lead-acid pack can do, and it has done it in one of the hottest climates in the United States.
Once the monsoon arrives, usually by mid-summer, humidity and dust add a second problem: terminals that were not cleaned before storage corrode faster once moisture is in the air, and a corroded terminal on top of a sulfated pack compounds the symptoms.
The plan that prevents it
- Charge to full before it sits, then top the water. A full pack self-discharges from a much better starting point.
- Disconnect the main negative cable, or use a maintenance charger on a timer if the cart’s electronics tolerate it.
- Have someone plug it in once a month. A neighbor, a house sitter, or a pre-booked mid-summer tune-up visit. One full charge a month keeps sulfation soft.
- Coat the terminals before you leave, especially ahead of monsoon season.
- Consider lithium if this is the second or third dead pack after a summer away. A lithium pack self-discharges slowly, does not sulfate, and comes back in the fall the way you left it. The battery replacement page has the comparison.
When the pack is finished
If the load test after a full charge attempt shows the pack collapsing, we say so with numbers, and you choose between lead-acid and lithium. What we will not do is sell a pack to a cart whose batteries came back fine, or try to recover a pack whose plates have been dry for five months of desert heat. Either way you get the readings.
What to expect on the call
Tell us how long the cart sat, whether it was charged first, and what the pack reads now if you have a meter. We bring a charger capable of bringing a low pack up to the point a normal charger will take over, a load tester, and a pack on the truck if the description points that way. The battery cost calculator prices the worst case in advance.
Frequently Asked Questions
We left for the summer and the cart is dead when we get back. Can the batteries be saved?
Sometimes. A pack that was fully charged before it sat and has simply self-discharged often comes back. A pack that sat at partial charge through a Goodyear summer, with 111.3 days a year at 100°F or above, has sulfated, and sulfation is not fully reversible. A proper charge attempt followed by a load test tells you which, and it is worth doing before buying anything.
Why will my charger not start on a dead pack?
Most modern chargers require a minimum pack voltage before they will begin, which protects them from a shorted pack. Below that threshold they see nothing and refuse. A pack can sometimes be brought up enough to hand off to the charger, which is one of the things a service visit can do.
What does it cost if the pack is finished?
$1,200 to $1,800 for a lead-acid pack installed, $1,600 to $3,500 for lithium. If the pack recovers, you pay the $50 to $100 service call and whatever cleanup the cart needs, usually a terminal service and a tune-up at $100 to $200.
How do I stop this happening next year?
Charge fully before you leave, top the water, disconnect the main negative cable or use a maintenance charger on a timer, and have someone charge it once a month. A lithium pack removes most of the problem: it self-discharges slowly and does not sulfate.