How to Hook Up Christmas Lights to a Golf Cart Battery
By James Gapinski
During the holidays, or simply as a year-round quirk, Christmas lights on a golf cart can add color, individuality and even some extra luminosity for games that unexpectedly run into nighttime hours. While a string of Christmas lights can be a fun addition to your golf cart, many people don't know how to properly hook up the lights to the cart's battery. Christmas lights are designed to run on an AC wall plug, not a DC battery source. Luckily, there are power inversion devices available to help you hook up the lights.
Instructions
Difficulty: Easy
Look at the label on your golf cart's battery to determine how many volts it is. If there is no label, this information can be found in the cart's user manual. Most standard golf carts use a 12-volt battery, but it's always a good idea to double-check. When you purchase a power inverter for use in the next step, it must be designed for the same voltage level as your battery.
Plug a power inverter into your cart's cigarette lighter. The cigarette lighter serves as an external access point to the battery power supply, allowing you to hook up the lights to the battery without ever having to directly access to the battery.
Connect a power inverter directly to the battery only if your cart's lighter does not function properly. Cigarette lighter battery connection is the most convenient, but terminal connection is also possible. Attach the red lead clamp of a power inverter to the positive terminal on the battery, and attach the black lead clamp to the negative terminal.
Plug the Christmas lights into the AC plug-in on the power inverter.
Turn on the golf cart motor and the Christmas lights will turn on.
Tips & Warnings
Make sure the power inverter has enough wattage output to accommodate your Christmas lights. Since Christmas lights are small, it's often easy to forget that they can draw a lot of power; according to ChristmasLightsEtc.com, an online holiday lights dealer, most standard Christmas light bulbs draw five or 10 watts each, depending on the exact light model. A string of 25 Christmas lights rated at seven watts each will draw 175 watts of power. To cut back on light wattage, consider using newer LED lights. ChristmasLightsEtc.com explains that 25 LED Christmas lights only draw 2.4 watts for the entire set.
Do not install a power inverter on your golf cart while the cart's engine is running. Always work on the cart with the engine safely turned off.
About The Author
James Gapinski is a writer with numerous online contributions, including those featured on JSOnline.com, Digital-Photography-School.com and the Milwaukee City Edition of Examiner.com. He is the recipient of the Burrows Award and the Angela Peckenpaugh Writing Award. Gapinski holds a Bachelor of Science in English with a writing emphasis from the University of Wisconsin, Whitewater.
