What voltage can I run on my son's Mini-Moto Go Kart safely?

[litespeed]

I bought this about 6 years ago for my son...it was a bit of a let down to say the least. The 36 volt 12 amp pack was bad from the git go and only gave short run time. After about a year I decided to buy another battery and the company sent me a new battery for free but still was disappointing as far as run time and speed. After sitting for some time and me with my renewed interest in e-stuff I wonder if I can revamp this thing with my lipo batteries I run in my R/C helicopters??? The Mini Moto is a 36 volt go kart with a pretty good sized 500 watt brushed motor on it. Does anyone know if i can run it on 12s lipo? That would be 44.4 nominal and 50.4 volts hot off the charger. I'd run a 12s3p which is more amp than the stock battery had which gave us about 1 hour run time. I'll betcha with a weight reduction of prolly 10 to 15 lbs and 30-50C discharge I betcha this thing could be what we always wanted it to be....mean! I'll have to post pictures tomorrow as I didn't know that this site doesn't except high resolution photos.

Tom

 

[liveforphysics]

Open up the controller. Read the part number off the FETs, look up the datasheet, and find the voltage rating. Then look at the voltage rating on the caps. If both are above 50v, you are likely OK to run 50v (but may require swapping a resistor or two in the voltage regulation stage that powers the controllers brain).