[MorTech]

Lithium batteries have a calendar life of maybe 15 years usually because of electrolyte and lattice breakdown...They won't last 39 years, yet.

Driving 5000 miles a year on a cart with ~80 mile range (210ah Star Sirius/Atlas): After 15 years and 75,000 miles you will use about 1000 charge cycles. The degradation on a LFP battery might be 10% after 1000 cycles so you will only be getting 72 miles per charge.

75,000 miles / 15 years on a gas cart would be 60 oil changes at $60 dollars or $3600. Just that one expense pays for a replacement lithium battery. Lithium carts cost one cent per mile in fuel - gas cart 10 cents per mile in fuel - $750 electric - $7500 gas. $6,750 saved.

Are you starting to see the value?

No gas cart ruckus, smell, and laughably awful throttle response. No gas cart maintenance and refueling inconvenience/expense.

The replacement battery 15 years from now will probably be Sodium Ion and cost $1500 in todays dollars.

To fill your automobile with gas might cost $50...Your electric golf cart charging will cost $50 per YEAR

[biker1]

The price of oil changes depends on whether you do it yourself. In which case, the cost is about $4 per oil change for my gas cart. Regarding the cost of "electric" fuel, my lithium-ion electric cart costs, at the electrical outlet during recharging, about 5 miles per kWh or about 2.5 cents per mile. My gas cart get 50 miles per gallon or about 7 cents per mile. Gas carts do have some additional "maintenance" items such as a new battery about every 5 years and maybe some belt replacements but these, along with the oil changes, are only about 10% of the fuel charges over 75,000 miles. I put the operating cost of my electric cart at about 1/3 of the operating cost of my gas cart or a 75,000 miles savings of about $4000. We will probably replace the 10 year old gas cart with another electric cart within the next couple of years.

Originally Posted by MorTech

Lithium batteries have a calendar life of maybe 15 years usually because of electrolyte and lattice breakdown...They won't last 39 years, yet.

Driving 5000 miles a year on a cart with ~80 mile range (210ah Star Sirius/Atlas): After 15 years and 75,000 miles you will use about 1000 charge cycles. The degradation on a LFP battery might be 10% after 1000 cycles so you will only be getting 72 miles per charge.

75,000 miles / 15 years on a gas cart would be 60 oil changes at $60 dollars or $3600. Just that one expense pays for a replacement lithium battery. Lithium carts cost one cent per mile in fuel - gas cart 10 cents per mile in fuel - $750 electric - $7500 gas. $6,750 saved.

Are you starting to see the value?

No gas cart ruckus, smell, and laughably awful throttle response. No gas cart maintenance and refueling inconvenience/expense.

The replacement battery 15 years from now will probably be Sodium Ion and cost $1500 in todays dollars.

To fill your automobile with gas might cost $50...Your electric golf cart charging will cost $50 per YEAR

[raggedy-andy]

Originally Posted by biker1

The price of oil changes depends on whether you do it yourself. In which case, the cost is about $4 per oil change for my gas cart. Regarding the cost of "electric" fuel, my lithium-ion electric cart costs, at the electrical outlet during recharging, about 5 miles per kWh or about 2.5 cents per mile. My gas cart get 50 miles per gallon or about 7 cents per mile. Gas carts do have some additional "maintenance" items such as a new battery about every 5 years and maybe some belt replacements but these, along with the oil changes, are only about 10% of the fuel charges over 75,000 miles. I put the operating cost of my electric cart at about 1/3 of the operating cost of my gas cart or a 75,000 miles savings of about $4000. We will probably replace the 10 year old gas cart with another electric cart within the next couple of years.

I lease an electric vehicle. The range for it is about 230 miles with average mixed driving. Around town it's better, on interstates it drops. The same model car would get around 25 mpg average on premium unleaded at around $4/gallon at the moment. That equals $0.16/mile. Even at $0.14/kWh and 3.4 miles per kWh, that's a bit over $0.04/mile. Biker1 is right in that the maintenance on an EV is less than a gas engine, and the operating cost much less.

The rub is the lack of range and the time to recharge making a gas vehicle more desirable, plus the lack of ability to recharge away from home. You can find a gas station every 2 miles or so in this country. In a nutshell, this is why that EV for us is basically an around-town car.

[MorTech]

2.5 cents per mile? My lead-acid cart did better than that!

The EZGO RXV Elite lithium does about one cent per mile.

Even using 5X instead of 10X it would be $3375

[biker1]

Doubtful. I put a watt meter on the cart while charging (you do realize the chargers are not 100% efficient? ) and measured about 200 watt-hours per mile to recharge. That is about 2.5 cents per mile at the current SECO total rate per kWh. The battery pack is 170 amp-hours and 60V and is good for about 60 miles. The battery pack is therefore 10,200 watt-hours or about 170 watt-hours per mile. This is consistent with the 200 watt-hours per mile to recharge when factoring in the less than 100% efficiency of the charger. If you were realizing 1 cent per mile then you cart would have a range approaching 200 miles (which it doesn’t even assuming a large battery pack of 210 amp-hours and 48V).

Originally Posted by MorTech

2.5 cents per mile? My lead-acid cart did better than that!

The EZGO RXV Elite lithium does about one cent per mile.

Even using 5X instead of 10X it would be $3375

[MorTech]

Pulling from SECO using a Kill-A-Watt.
EZGO Elite has regenerative braking.

Even the Aptera does 100wh / mile if driven gently.
Aptera Motors
Great vehicle for some in TV.

[Two Bills]

Originally Posted by rsimpson

Why make a "good electric cart" when Yamaha make the BEST gas model.
Focus on what you do best.

Polaroid did that as well.

[rhood]

Originally Posted by Bay Kid

Why can't Yamaha make a good battery cart? I asked the salesman about their carts and he said that Yamaha doesn't make a good battery cart for distance. Why? Other cart brands get + 50 mile run time.

From the Yamaha catalog

[Bay Kid]

Originally Posted by rhood

From the Yamaha catalog

Attachment 104015

That is pitiful. So at 15 miles you start to worry.