Has anyone tried running an electric vehicle with car jumper cables?

Situation: Bought used Hyster electric pallet jack with no fluid visible in battery so we're pretty sure it is quite dead. I'd just buy a new battery if I was sure there were no big problems with the rest of the vehicle. I think I could have the local Hyster shop put in their battery and test it but it'll cost (my guess) $500. If I take it to him.

So since I have a good 24v. Battery (higher A.h.than the Hyster) in our Clark narrow-aisle straddle-stacker, I thought of using very carefully-arranged car jumper cables to run juice over to the Hyster for some quick, basic tests of the drive motor and lift system. I know I'd have to build plug adapters to join jumper cable to the vehicles' battery plugs. I could put a large fuse, say 200 amps, on one cable if needed but would sacrifice the jumper cables, still small price to pay compared to a $2500 battery I might not need.

Any chance this would succeed or are you just wondering what I'm smoking?

Sure, something like that will work fine. You need to make the cables up with adequate ampacity to carry the draw (unknown?) of the pallet jack. Any welding cables around?

I'd try it with two automotive batteries in series. Should be easily available and any decent jumper cables will be able to handle what the batteries will deliver for a quick function test. Hell, one good automotive/truck battery will probably run it if it's "old school" technology.

Unloaded 4 gauge cables should be heavy enough for tests. Some OO truck cables would be nice for some load tests.

extropic said:

Sure, something like that will work fine. You need to make the cables up with adequate ampacity to carry the draw (unknown?) of the pallet jack. Any welding cables around?

I'd try it with two automotive batteries in series. Should be easily available and any decent jumper cables will be able to handle what the batteries will deliver for a quick function test. Hell, one good automotive/truck battery will probably run it if it's "old school" technology.

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Yea, you could probably use it with two regular 12v deep cycle batteries. Run time wouldn't be as long but for occasional use it would probably be ok. If you do this, make sure you use deep cycle batteries, regular auto batteries don't like to be discharged and charged back up.