Golf carts

I'm considering adding a used golf cart to our homestead. Our 15 acres is narrow and long, walking from end to end with a tool box or fencing supplies is a challenge. I've seen some really handy golf carts with a back bed to carry things. My questions for the hive mind are:

Electric or gas, and why?

Any brands to avoid?

Lessons learned?

How many hours can you get out of the electric vs the gasoline? Since your property is long and narrow, a gasoline model would be more appropriate since the electric model will only run so long before it needs to be recharged.  If its battery goes dead you might have to walk home.  With gasoline you just make sure you have a full tank or a spare gas can.

We have a golf cart and a mule.  DH says that the golf cart investment was the best money we ever spent.  And since getting the mule, there are very few places that the mule is better than the golf cart.  We have used the golf cart on rocky mountain roads.  The mule might be better in mud since it is 4 wheel drive??

The kind of tires you put on it might also make a difference.  The golf cart and the mule use the same tires.  Our golf cart has tires for rock and the mule came with tires for mud (which we want to change to the rock kind).

Ours is a Club Car and also has the a back bed to carry things, which is also a good investment.

I don't know if there are brand to avoid; just might be some are more expensive than others?

No lessons learned other than what I have mentioned and they a fun to play with, like joy riding!

For just driving around your property, I'd recommend an electric cart.  They typically have 35-50 miles range, so it's unlikely you will ever run out of juice.  With electric you never have to go out and buy gasoline.  
Mount a couple solar panels on top and it charges for free and provides shade.  A golf cart (or similar low speed vehicle) is the only type where mounting solar panels on the vehicle makes sense.

They used to make an electric garden tractor that had all kinds of electric implements, rototillers, chain saws, etc.
With an electric golf cart, you could add an inverter and run electric tools, chain saws, weed eaters, etc.  Granted you can buy gasoline powered tools, but now you are back to having to go to the gas station periodically to buy gas.

Granted you'll have to buy new batteries every 6-8 years, but in the long run batteries are cheaper than annual oil changes, filter changes, tune ups, gasoline, etc. trips to buy gas, trips to buy oil, etc. trips to get rid of used oil, etc., etc., etc.

Peter VanDerWal wrote:For just driving around your property, I'd recommend an electric cart.  They typically have 35-50 miles range, so it's unlikely you will ever run out of juice.  ...
Mount a couple solar panels on top and it charges for free and provides shade.  A golf cart (or similar low speed vehicle) is the only type where mounting solar panels on the vehicle makes sense.

When we worked at places that used golfcarts on a daily basis, I don't remember getting that much mileage.  A google resulted in this:  "Electric carts are designed for 36 holes of golf between charging. 36 holes of golf is about 12 miles, with starting and stopping. If you plan to use the cart ... extensively, then you need an electric car. "

www.cunninghamgolfcar.com/t-frequentlyaskedquestions.

They used to make an electric garden tractor that had all kinds of electric implements, rototillers, chain saws, etc.
With an electric golf cart, you could add an inverter and run electric tools, chain saws, weed eaters, etc.  Granted you can buy gasoline powered tools, but now you are back to having to go to the gas station periodically to buy gas.

Speaking of electric tractors this thread might be of interest:

https://permies.com/t/35742/permaculture-projects/Wheaton-Laboratories-Electric-Tractor


Another thing to consider, is your property flat?  Will you be driving mostly on pavement?  Will there be places that are rocky or muddy?   How will you be using the cart?  Will you use it in snow or rain?

Maybe a little more information on how you intend to use the cart would give folks something to base their replies on.  Are you looking at new or used?

Sorry, I should have pointed out that I was referring to the MAXIMUM range.

You don't want to fully discharge a golf cart battery frequently because that will significantly shorten their lifespan.  To get maximum life you only want to discharge 20-50% of batteries capacity before charging it again.  12 miles would be approximately a 30% discharge.

I'm assuming Dan isn't planning on making 20 trips a day, every day, from one end of his property to the other.  If he is, then a gas cart, or two electric carts, would be a better option.

Even if he makes 10 trips a day, every day, that is probably less than 50% discharge.

Thanks everyone for their thoughts. I think electric is the way I'll go. There are fewer for sale on Craigslist, but I don't need it ASAP, so I can take my time. I do like the thought of putting some tires on it that are a bit more aggressive. They come with tires that are not supposed to mar a golf course. That's not very good traction. My property does have a rise and fall when traveling from one end to the other, so some tread pattern will be valuable. Putting up a 100 watt array on the roof is a good idea and I likely will do that as well as a charging station where it will be parked in our lower garage. Trips might, at most, be 2-3 trips around the 15 acres a day -- at most!

Cheers!

Anne Miller wrote:the golf cart investment was the best money we ever spent.

I completely agree with your husbands sentiment and I have told everyone who will listen that exact thing. Hands down best homestead investment we have made.

We purchased a used 2015 EZGO. It does not have the back seat but only the golf bag holder.

We disabled the reverse alarm right away.

We added a front cargo basket, rear view mirror, hitch, and a 10 CUFT poly manual dump trailer that we can tow behind it. We installed knobby 4 wheeler tires on the back and I have never had a traction issue. I move the chicken tractors with it and a million other things.

Although very helpful when needed, I despise breaking the natural sounds around us with cranking up a gas/diesel engine. 100% would go with the battery powered golf cart verses gas. We charge it about once every 3 weeks.

I spent 1999 through 2009 working at a camp.  It was 42 acres and we had to run around over about 2/3 of it.  Some of it was paved, some was   grass and weeds.  We used golf carts for a lot of that running around.  They were all Clubcar.  2 were gas and one was electric.  Both types had strong points.  Electric were easier to fix.  The gas powered could be re-fueled in a few minutes instead of hours of charging.
It really depends on what your usage requirements are.

I just replaced my old electric with a gas powered club car. There are cheaper options than club car brand but the ones my dealer offers have aluminum frames where cc has steel. I went with gas because I’m in the south and batteries in the heat tend to boil themselves dry if left hooked up and the battery life feature was the first thing to die in the electric. We have a 4x4 and a golf cart and the 4x4 is the best option for the remote and overgrown sections as well as for building fences but I love the golf cart for quick trips around the various houses and the mailbox approximately 800’ from my house. I also have a garden cart which I attach to the golf cart to work on the electric fences. The new one has a utility bed that dumps but I haven’t yet used it. I just got the new one last week. It’s essentially a refurbished one that the dealer fixed up and resold. I have tumors on the bottom of my feet so I’m limited in how far I am able to walk each day and the golf cart is an extremely important tool for me. Good luck on deciding what will best suit you!

A few years ago, thinking like an aging prepper about homesteading, I decided I wanted an electric 4x4 side by side.  I discovered that they are quite hard to find both used in good condition and new.  We had to pick up our new Hisun Sector E1 in Pennsylvania on a trailer (we're in Michigan.)  I wanted electric for the quiet operation (gas engines draw attention if hardly anything is running) and the ability to recharge it for years using solar power rather than rely on stored gasoline and then have a useless machine once the gas ran out.

Initially my partner thought it would be a waste of money, however once he started using it on our own long, narrow property, he loved it and kept telling me that it made it possible for him to do more chores himself despite his disability.  We've used it to pull our riding mower out of a ditch, and my guy uses it daily to do poultry chores and move small amounts of materials.  I tried to use it to haul compost/soil from the roadside to my raised beds, but unfortunately learned that the little dump bed only works if I can physically lift it up to the dump angle, which I could not when it was full of soil.  Even half full was difficult for me to muscle.  I ended up shoveling out most of the soil, then dumping the rest once it was light enough to lift.  Really that is the only complaint I have about it.  Otherwise it's amazing, and will allow us to continue working our little homestead (even if some kind of apocalypse takes place) into our old age.  It has a winch and a tow hitch, and we got the optional plow blade so we can take care of our own driveway without physically shoveling snow.  I love that I can drive back to the back of the property hauling several buckets of water to care for new plantings which before would have worn me out walking back and forth carrying two jugs at a time.

We researched the battery set-up in it, and learned that it's best to keep it plugged in when not in use rather than run the battery down over several days before recharging it.  It can go up to, if I recall correctly, 42 miles on a charge, but only using it on our property never even comes close to running it halfway down.  Most people who had issues with this model did not care for the batteries properly, so we made sure to do it right from the beginning.

The major downside is the cost (it was around $12,000 new) but in this case I considered it an investment worth having monthly payments.  If I had to do it over, I would definitely do it just the same and buy the same model new.  

Donna Lynn wrote:...unfortunately learned that the little dump bed only works if I can physically lift it up to the dump angle, which I could not when it was full of soil.  Even half full was difficult for me to muscle.  I ended up shoveling out most of the soil, then dumping the rest once it was light enough to lift.  

Yes, we learned the same about trailers. If there isn't some sort of "assisted lift mechanism" - a winch or a piston system or? - it is very easy to have it be too heavy to be practical or functional.

One thing I do, is actually shovel into buckets and stick the buckets into the trailer. That way I can tip the buckets instead of having to shovel a second time.  Light material such as mulch from tree branches can be shoveled into garbage cans, but if it's too wet, I will need help lifting the can into the trailer, or have to get sneaky and lift 3/4 full cans, then add more after, until the can is full.

Hopefully we just save a reader from the same life-lesson!

Truthfully, my wife is the biggest user of the vehicles on the property (~15 acres) as she has rescue animals...stalls to clean and buckets of feed to haul.  Here in NW Minnesota (Red River Valley) it's flat as a pancake, so climbing hills is not an issue.  For a while we had a gas John Deere Gator, but that had its issues and we decided to get rid of it.  Was lucky enough to find a used 2012 Polaris Range EV electric for $6000 with only 200 hrs on it.  Wife was very concerned and sceptical about reliability and performance, but now she is in love with thing!  It's quiet, pulls all she needs in terms of carts and sleds, and can haul all of her feed buckets just fine.  In my retirement, I've taken on 'solarizing' this and a 1990 EZGO electric golf cart.  These two are complemented by a new Kubota RTV520 gas:  The Kubo and the Polaris are both 4X4 wheras the golf cart is standard rear-wheel drive.

For those interested, I would encourage looking into the solar charging option, although your usage of the vehicles will impact this.  In the photos below, you can see that the golf cart is self-contained....solar panel on top charges the batteries all day--WHEN NEEDED.  By that I mean the solar juice goes through a charge controller mounted inside the battery compartment.....as the batteries get full, the current slowly tapers off to near zero so that you don't overcook the batteries.  (Since my batteries are WAY past their prime, their self-discharge is significant and the solar will just continue to top them up as the cart sits in the driveway.)  Also, having that set up does not prevent still being able to use the usual plug-in-the-wall charging that is typically used with such carts.  For the Polaris Ranger, it's somewhat different.  Wife did not want to risk the solar panel getting banged up in the brush and trees that she was driving through, so we opted at this point to create a solar charging station shown below.  In this case, a solar panel was mounted on the roof of the carport with the charge controller mounted on the inside wall.  A standard 3-prong receptacle was mounted on the Ranger in the same location as where the gas models have their gas cap.  So charging is as simple as plugging the cord from the charge controller into the Ranger which "tells" the controller what kind of battery bank its charging (12V or 36V or 48V).  Then a separate on/off switch on the wall allows power to flow from the solar panel to the controller.  Our arrangement here (for summer use) is that I plug it in when feeding chickens in the morning, the arc of the sun is enough to charge it up to full by 11 am or noon, and that is about the time wife likes to start on chores.  It gets intermittent use during the day, then more use during feeding at night before storing back in carport at ~11 pm.

In both cases, we are running on old lead acid batteries, badly out of day and near end of life.  Amazingly, the solar option allows for quick, cost-effective recharging that reduces the impact of poor battery performance considering how they are being used in our instance.  Hope to go to newer battery technology soon to reduce weight and maintenance issues.  I'm hugely sold on this approach to homestead power.

Got this email on an old post.  i had an electric golf cart for years (probably from reading this post) - remember that you need to check and refill the water levels in the batteries ~1x/month - giving yourself another farm chore.  (the is probably more true in hot climates vs cold climates.).  The batteries last 3-5 years and me cost $800 or $1000(?) to replace -  make sure you would be using it enough to replace a $1000 of gasoline over that time.  When the batteries died I got rid of it.  For me now, if I want to scoot around and check thinks out I use an off-road electric bike - the lithium batteries are maintenance free and I can use it to get into town.  I should look into a bike trailer, but for now use my pick up if I'm hauling tools, chainsaws, wood etc.  Good luck.

Jay Angler wrote:One thing I do, is actually shovel into buckets and stick the buckets into the trailer. That way I can tip the buckets instead of having to shovel a second time.  Light material such as mulch from tree branches can be shoveled into garbage cans, but if it's too wet, I will need help lifting the can into the trailer, or have to get sneaky and lift 3/4 full cans, then add more after, until the can is full.

Hopefully we just save a reader from the same life-lesson!

Great idea using buckets inside the dump trailer for divvying up the weight of solids!  I'll remember that for the next time I have soil to move.

Patrick Freeburger wrote:Got this email on an old post.  i had an electric golf cart for years (probably from reading this post) - remember that you need to check and refill the water levels in the batteries ~1x/month - giving yourself another farm chore.  (the is probably more true in hot climates vs cold climates.).  The batteries last 3-5 years and me cost $800 or $1000(?) to replace -  make sure you would be using it enough to replace a $1000 of gasoline over that time.  When the batteries died I got rid of it.  For me now, if I want to scoot around and check thinks out I use an off-road electric bike - the lithium batteries are maintenance free and I can use it to get into town.  I should look into a bike trailer, but for now use my pick up if I'm hauling tools, chainsaws, wood etc.  Good luck.

I’ve seen videos of hunters pulling deer out of the woods with electric bikes.  If they will do that, they can pull a small trailer for tools, fencing materials, feed, etc.