Costco vs Sams Club 6V Golf Cart Batteries

[crcr]

Hi,

I'm about to buy two new 6V golf cart batteries for my TT. I am choosing between the Costco and the Sams Club 6V batteries. Here is all the stats provided for each battery where I live:

Costco: Interstate battery, Item #517990, size GC2, Reserve Capacity, 100RC, $79.99 ea

Sams Club: Emergizer battery, size CG2, 107 RC minutes @ 75 amps, 220AH, $81.83 ea

Dimensions of the batteries is identical, at 7" W x 10 1/4" L x 11" H. I know weight is important, heavier indicating more lead plates, but I had no scale to measure the weight of each. Both have 12 month free replacement. I realize the AH is probably the most important factor here, since price is pretty close to equal, but the Costco battery did not provide that information. Can anyone tell me what the rated AH are for the Costco Interstate battery?

Any other comments about pros and cons of one of these over the other, would be welcome. Thanks in advance for any information!

[Gale_Hawkins]

Yesterday I was working with batteries and our 6300 or 7300 (1992 era) float is up to 14.1 from 13.2 or so. It is due to the aging batteries I expect making it look like they need more charging but due to their health that can not happen.

This is the reason we start having to add more water and then even more water at them.

The MH has two 12v batteries but the GC has six 6v Trojan T-105's dated Oct 2006 and is on a smart charger and is on a high end tender 24/7 and some have cells that loose water at a faster rate than others.

From my experience neither dumb or smart charges can deal well with batteries at their end of life cycle but both are OK with sound batteries.

Dumb charges I think kill by over charging and smart chargers kill by under charging so one can choose the poison of their choice. The old chargers do equalize by default I have found.

Still my go to charger for the most info is a $30 total manual 6v/6amp, 12v/2 amp and 12v/6amp charger. On a 12 volt battery set on 12/6 amp setting if over night it has not tapered to 1 amp of output I know the battery is nearing the fail point 100% of the time.

RV batteries for the most part take too much abuse to live a long life. As I get older I wish I had not spent so many hours obsessing over RV and other batteries life. Like us they are born dying so use them before you loss them. 🙂

[DryCamper11]

westend wrote:
My plans are to add a more modern converter in the future and keep the old one for backup.

That's what we did. I believe my 1972 converter is a Philips - combo battery converter, AC breaker panel and charger (separate small tap diode and a big wirewound resistor. Talk about fancy!) - but I modified it so much that the label is no longer readable.

[dlsnow]

The 70's must have been a great decade for quality manufacturing. The 1972 greyhound bus I have us built like a tank. Everything is stainless and aluminum and the frame is mild steel all around.

I can speak for my inverter. Outback makes a great inverter/charger. It is program able and made for 24/7/365 operation. Mine has been running for 1.5 years and aside from switching over the batteries it hasn't been shutoff or had any issues.

[westend]

DryCamper11 wrote:

westend wrote:
it's built so darn well and seems to be treating my batteries good. It has one big piece of iron for a transformer and a large heatsink for the rectifiers. I don't know if Progressive Ind. was ahead of it's time or if others were built to a lesser standard. Maybe I got lucky.:)

Those old converters were heavy and solid. My heat sinks are 8" x 8" plates - one on each side. They had massive transformers with huge diodes on the heat sinks. Mine, built in 1972-3, will probably last another 50 years, but it just doesn't have the smarts to treat a battery well. They had lousy voltage regulation and no concept of stages (bulk, absorption, float, equalization, etc.).

I'm considering pulling out the transformer to run my outdoor 12V lighting system. I thought about keeping it, adding some linear voltage control and smart circuitry for battery charging, but the cost/time wasn't worth it.

Yeah, I hear 'ya on the disadvantages re cycles and regulation. I didn't get too far into the circuits in the 808, more impressed by the weight and layout then anything.
My plans are to add a more modern converter in the future and keep the old one for backup. Currently, solar does all of my charging.

[Hurricaner]

Magnetec made both a ferroresonant and a linear converter. The 6300 was not a ferroresonant converter it is a linear converter which basically uses a conventional transformer with a full wave rectifier and requires a separate charger circuit if battery charging was required.

Sam

[DryCamper11]

westend wrote:
it's built so darn well and seems to be treating my batteries good. It has one big piece of iron for a transformer and a large heatsink for the rectifiers. I don't know if Progressive Ind. was ahead of it's time or if others were built to a lesser standard. Maybe I got lucky.:)

Those old converters were heavy and solid. My heat sinks are 8" x 8" plates - one on each side. They had massive transformers with huge diodes on the heat sinks. Mine, built in 1972-3, will probably last another 50 years, but it just doesn't have the smarts to treat a battery well. They had lousy voltage regulation and no concept of stages (bulk, absorption, float, equalization, etc.).

I'm considering pulling out the transformer to run my outdoor 12V lighting system. I thought about keeping it, adding some linear voltage control and smart circuitry for battery charging, but the cost/time wasn't worth it.

[westend]

Interesting discussion about old chargers. In my rig I have a 1971 Progressive Industries Model #708 converter. It's continuous rating is 30 amps. It was offered as just a 12V DC supply or as a battery charger with an equipped PC board that sockets into the front of the converter.

The manual says that the charging circuit board senses temp difference in the converter's electronics and delivers between 12.2v-15v.

I wasn't thinking about keeping his converter, long time, but it's built so darn well and seems to be treating my batteries good. It has one big piece of iron for a transformer and a large heatsink for the rectifiers. I don't know if Progressive Ind. was ahead of it's time or if others were built to a lesser standard. Maybe I got lucky.:)

I have it switched off for the Winter, the solar is handling the float charge.

[DryCamper11]

MEXICOWANDERER wrote:
The relay switched the converter in and out isolating the battery when the converter took over duty of powering up the 12 volt system.

I ran with one of these for many years. The only thing I'd add is that the relay that switched the battery in and out often switched only a limited number of loads. A set of glass fuses on the front of this type of converter were divided into fuses for devices that could live with unregulated DC (lights) and items that needed clean DC power (the radio). The former were powered directly from the converter via the relay and the latter were driven from the battery at all times. This type of converter built many a battery manufacturer's fortune as they had to be watched like a hawk and tweaked to prevent damaging the battery. Most new RV purchasers rolled out of the lot, plugged in their new RV and a few weeks later had a dry, destroyed battery.

[MEXICOWANDERER]

Most of the older RV "converters" were of ferroresonant design. A transformer, relay, capacitors. When the capacitors aged, the voltage creeps up. If you doubt this, get ahold of an old converter. Connect a 5,000 uf electrolytic capacitor to the output and see what the voltage does. Surprise! it climbs. Just adding a 2nd battery caused the voltage to go up, a 3rd battery, WOW!

But placed on a timer, these critters make an inexpensive (free) battery charger that can be tamed with a mechanical timer, and tuned by adding (or subtracting) capacitance. Limit the battery charging amperage potential by using small charge lead wires (trial and error - start off with 14 gauge). Connected directly to a battery these things can over-amp. They used a huge BLEED RESISTOR to shunt power to charge the battery. Normally these critters were BATTERY SUBSTITUTES. The relay switched the converter in and out isolating the battery when the converter took over duty of powering up the 12 volt system.

[wa8yxm]

Shawnmdarnell wrote:
What OBC are you guys using that puts out over 15 volts?

Well, for one the Magnetek 6300, it was designed in the days when power companies generally delivered 115 volts (I go back to 110 volt days) and today you find 120-125 in many parks.

IT had very poor regulation, in fact by my standards it had NO regulation, what it had was a ferroresonate transformer which sort of kind a regulates but not very well.

So, that is why it has a rep as a battery boiler.

Also any converter, if the pass transistor shorts.. You get overvoltage

[dlsnow]

I believe the Costco gc2 is a closer match for the t605. I think I saw that on the interstate site for comperables.

[CVD]

Has anyone noticed a slight width difference between the T105 and the Sam’s GC2?

I ask because my battery tray footprint is 25” x 14”. I have 4 Sam’s batteries that are 7” wide. They fit with maybe a business card width between them. The T105’s are listed as 7.11” wide. If they really are .11” wider (times 2), I don’t have room for the Trojans.

[DryCamper11]

Shawnmdarnell wrote:
What OBC are you guys using that puts out over 15 volts?

The converter in my '73 RV did. It boiled away the battery in a week if I allowed it. My Sears OBC did. Most of the older inexpensive chargers with a heavy transformer in them have nothing fancier than a diode after the transformer and would charge to above 15 if the current dropped low. For years, I had a timer on my RV converter for charging.

[Shawnmdarnell]

What OBC are you guys using that puts out over 15 volts?

[Gale_Hawkins]

The funny part all the old battery chargers did charge at 15 volts as amperage approached zero.

My favorite charger has become a 6 amp @ 6 volts and 2/6 amp@ 12 volts $30 manual charger from TSC.

Overnight set on 6 amp/12 volts the rate of charge will drop to 1 amp UNLESS the battery is failing. The charging voltage will be approaching 16 volts.

One side effect is the battery is equalized.