Hey, this may belong more in the "transportation" forum but seeing as I'm only asking about batteries, I'm hoping I'll get more traffic here. My question is can someone point me towards a good supplier for 6 volt batteries? Just got a little electric golf cart and it needs 6 batteries. The near 200 dollar prices I'm seeing are just out of my price range. Range isn't a huge issue, so I may just end up getting 3 12 volt batteries, but... would rather do it right. $1200 bucks is just out of the question though.

Anyhow, I figured some permies solar folks would have an idea of a good place to find my batteries for an affordable price

I'm a very crafty guy and plan on rigging up a solar station for this critter with some help from a couple friends who are electronics experts

Trojan T-105's are going for about 135.00 + core in my area so 200.00 a piece sounds a little steep. That battery is a pretty standard golf cart battery. I've seen golf cart batteries at the, local Costco for about 35.00 less but didn't compare amp hrs to a T-105. Might be worth a look of you have one nearby.

I'm way out in the woods so ordering is my only option for these things without driving for many hours. I would do that for a dramatic savings, obviously it would be worth the time, but hoping someone knows where a good internet based supplier is.

thank you for the price point comparison though! I paid 300 bucks for the cart in good condition, except the batteries, I'm drawing the line at somewhere in the 1,000 dollar range for it to work

Thank you Robert Ray By searching for Trojan t-105 I was able to find some good deals online.

You can sometimes buy good used golf cart batteries from a course, when they replace them in bulk. Look into an electronic desulfator if you own lead acid batteries. They quickly pay for themselves. I use one on my car batteries. It brought one of them back from the dead, and will extend the life of any lead acid battery.

A great source for batteries is your local interstate dealer , used return batteries called ECONO batteries . The Batteries that are returned under warranty ,Tested and have been found to have nothing wrong with them ( usually because some one thought the battery was bad and it was the starter or alternator that was the real problem , or in a few cases they left the headlights on and blamed the battery )
they sell them for 26.00$ ea and they have deep cycle ones too. i got all my ups batteries from them 12 OPTIMA red/blue topped batteries for 50.00 ea and all the ones i got tested @95% or better on load tests ,so i have been very happy ( the reds were 25 AH and the blue deep cycle were 40 AH ). The OPTIMA battery in my Jeep Cherokee is 18 yrs old and still starting it on the -10 mornings.
They wont always have the OPTIMA batteries but if anyone's looking for cheap batteries to use for solar that is a good place to check out. they have no warranty on them but if you get a bad one within 30 days or so they will swap it for another one.
One other thing , they some times have larger batteries that the phone company turned in that were backup power batteries that are a few years old that are like new they just swap them as part on regular service due to their age.
Hope that helps any one starting out in solar on a budget.

T105's for $149 at this store: Altestore

The shipping will not be cheap. To my house it was $225 for shipping.

GC2 are 6 volt golf cart batteries, I see them at Sam's and Costco for about $85 each plus core charge. If you take any old battery for trade in, you beat the core charge...

Cool project; sounds like a bigger version of laserhacker's upgraded solar kiddie car. Note that he used LiFePO4 batteries for their safety, capacity, and light weight: http://laserhacker.com/?p=299

There is a local place near me that sells refurbished batteries. I happened to stumble on them on craigslist. I had to order a new battery from them for my golf cart, as they did not have a refurbished one. However, it still only cost $80 and had a three year warranty.

I can say that 'the Solar Biz' has good prices and service on batteries

I actually got 1600 pounds of Surrettes shipped for $200 (this was 6 years ago)

I consult with a company that liquidates assets of companies that are relocating or have gone out of business. Primarily I deal with the standby plants (APU, batteries, rectifiers and inverters). After a project last December involving the removal of 500 flooded lead acid batteries, I wondered if there was an alternate market for these batteries other than recycling. I do not remember the capacity of these cells but I believe somewhere around 1600amp/hr. Anyway these batteries were less than 5yrs old and on the two I tested with a Midtronic were at 90% or better. We also removed 6 cabinets (40 cell each) of VRLA batteries approx. 100amp/hr. If there is a market for these used cells I will suggest to the contractors to start listing.

I would think that there would be a good sized market.

I read of a guy who bought a bank of used 'backup' batteries from a phone company. They routinely swapped out their batteries every X many years. He has had them for over 5 years without any issues. They cost him about 25% of what new batteries would have cost him. A happy camper. Even when totally dead, they are still worth about 28 cents per pound.

Perhaps. In thinking further about this- the transportation, storage and charging may put this outside of profitability. I know that on the subject batteries in my post the recycling was around $75k. Contractors like the fast turn on their money so this may be a hard sale to them.

Getting batteries from telephone companies is probably thing of the past as the EPA is requiring death certificates from the smelter on this class of user.

the transportation, storage and charging may put this outside of profitability.

They already need to provide the transportation from the job site to the recycle site.
Transportation from their facility to a customer would be paid by the buyer.
So, their transportation costs may actually become less, depending on locations.

The fast return issue would certainly play into this if they were only making a few extra pennies per pound.
I have no idea how fast the turn around might be, or the value of used batteries, but if it was a 10-20% higher profit, it might pay off. They might even get some good PR if they were actually putting these to good use, rather than just melting them down.

I guess that the big question would be "What is the market (in this region) for reclaimed batteries?"
It could be a bonanza, or it could end up being an overall loss.
Certainly worth looking into with that volume of a valuable resource.

Is there a battery distributor in the region who might be interested in dealing with used batteries?
Depending on distances and prices, it could be more profitable than just scrapping them.