Golf Cart Batteries are Most Popular in Electric Cars

What kind of electric car batteries are people actually using now, and why? Answer: Golf cart batteries, mostly. I went to austinev.org's large collection of electric vehicles (1200+ as of today) to find out why: they're cheap, reliable, long-lasting, and available everywhere.

You can even find them on the freeway!

#1 most popular electric car batteries in actual use:
Flooded Lead-acid

This is by far the most popular battery type (and yes, most of them are golf cart batteries). Why? Primarily because it's cheap...but also because it's available in a lot of different configurations, sizes, and shapes, and VERY widely accessible. You'll also hear this one called the vented, wet, or unsealed battery, to distinguish it from the other lead-acid battery types. This means you keep adding water to it now and then, and that it will vent (exhale) small amounts of hydrogen and oxygen gas into the air when it charges.

Two important points about these batteries: One, no matter how good the idea seems at the time, never put seawater in your flooded lead-acid battery. If you do, it will vent poisonous chlorine gas and kill you.

And two, take care when charging not to OVER-charge them...

...because they vent hydrogen and oxygen gas, which tend to be excitable. (After the explosion, you can explain it 'til you're blue - but all your neighbors will hear is "meth lab"; )

Examples of the flooded lead-acid battery include the Trojan batteries (T-1275 12 volt batteries or T-875 8 volt batteries), and the US-125 from US Battery.

#2 most popular electric car batteries in actual use:
AGM Lead-acid

The AGM (Absorbed Glass Mat) lead-acid battery is the best quality lead acid battery you can buy; it's the latest, best technology of an old, reliable battery chemistry. A little more expensive, but longer-lived (4-7 years) and safer than the flooded kind.

What's absorbed glass mat technology about?

Well, first take a good old flooded lead-acid battery...

...seal it up and remove the need to keep filling it with water, along with the possibility of spilling acid all over yourself and your car (and venting explosive gases), add cycle life and the ability to charge a little faster without ruining it, and you'll have arrived at AGM technology. It uses a fiberglass-like mat to hold the electrolyte liquid in place rather than just gooing it up with thickener as the gel batteries do (scroll down a little to read about gel batteries).

Examples of the lead-acid AGM battery include Optima batteries (yellow-top), Hawker batteries (16XE or 2150), and the Champion GNB batteries.

If you want detailed information about AGM batteries, see Northern Arizona Wind and Sun's FAQ page.

#3 most popular electric car batteries in actual use:
Gel Lead-acid

Gelled lead acid batteries are also sealed rather than vented, with silica gel added to the electrolyte to keep the liquid from sloshing around. Note that these require a special charger (slower and lower voltage than AGM or flooded batteries use) to prevent damage. See Northern Arizona Wind and Sun's FAQ page again for details on this.

Examples of the lead-acid gel battery include the Deka batteries (like the Dominator 8G27 and 8G31) and others.

So which golf cart batteries are SLA and VRLA, and what does it mean to me?

SLA (easy to confuse with SLI, the starting-lighting-ignition battery that cranks the Chevy) means Sealed Lead-Acid, and is commonly used to mean "any lead-acid battery you don't have to keep filling with water". The really smart people will point out that no lead-acid battery is truly "sealed", because the charging process makes them (all) exhale a bit of hydrogen and oxygen gas, which has to go somewhere! The best lead-acid golf cart batteries encourage the gases to join up and pop out water molecules, so not much of it lingers around to cause trouble - unless you accidentally overcharge.

VRLA means "valve-regulated lead-acid", meaning it's got a valve on it that maintains a little positive pressure all the time, so it stays sealed unless there's an honest-to-goodness gas-venting emergency. It's just better technology, but the same thing.

Faster than a speeding club car?

In case you were reluctant to turn your Voltsporsche into a golf cart, check out these electric sports cars!