Caddie Wheel - Power Assist for Your Existing Pushcart

[boogielicious]

I got the chance to review the Caddie Wheel, an add-on to your existing cart that allows remote control power assist. I would like to thank Mark Yeramian, Marketing Manager at Caddie Wheel, for the opportunity.

We’ve seen reviews on the site for other power carts and remote control power systems. This is the first one I’ve seen with minimal modifications to your existing cart. I will add more content to this thread as I use the Caddie Wheel on the course. The website is below.

Caddie Wheel - Power Assist Your Golf Caddy

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The Caddie Wheel attaches to golf push carts, taking the heavy lifting out and making the walk on the golf course more enjoyable. The Caddie Wheel is the easiest and most effective way to power your golf caddy.

The system is essentially a powered wheel you add to the rear end of your cart. You add the mounting brackets to your existing cart and the wheel/battery can be easily put on and removed. Your cart can still function as a push cart with the Caddie Wheel removed. 

It is compatible with a lot of current push carts, Bag Boy, CaddyTek, Clicgear, Sun Mountain, Stewart, KVV and Omaha. See the full list here. They are always adding new carts, so if you don’t see yours, contact Caddie Wheel.

Compatible Carts

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The Caddie Wheel attaches to golf push carts, taking the heavy lifting out and making the walk on the golf course more enjoyable. The Caddie Wheel is the easiest and most effective way to power your golf caddy.

Caddie Wheel is based in Canada. The Caddie Wheel costs $549 US and ships from Canada. Shipping is FREE on all orders. You can buy an additional mounting kit for the same kind of cart, but not a different model or make. I will probably get one for my other Clicgear. They currently do not ship outside the US or Canada. I couldn’t find the cost of just a bracket on the site.

The Caddie Wheel comes well packed.

Parts include mounting brackets, wheel and battery assembly, charger, remote, hardware, zip ties and a zip tie tool! The tool is a cool addition for tool nerds like me.

Installation

Installation is straight forward with the instructions provided in a pdf that included pictures. I installed it on my Clicgear 3.5 (which is identical to my other 4.0). In addition to what Caddie Wheel provides, you will also need a screwdriver and socket or spanner wrench to help remove the current mounting bolts and nuts on your current cart and to retighten.

It took about 20 minutes to attach the mounting brackets. First step is to attach the mounting assembly to the wheel. They provided lock-washers, which is smart.

Then you add the mounting brackets to the cart. The brackets appear to be 3D printed strong plastic. First you remove the mounting bolts then attach the brackets with the new bolts and lock nuts. Here is the left side. The lock nut is the nylon interior type. Another washer here maybe a good idea to reduce stress on the plastic part.

Below are both lower brackets on the Clicgear 3.5. Zip ties are used to tighten the mounting bracket against the smaller stay. The tool made it easy to tighten. You can see the zip tie just above the right bracket on the small stay.

The top bracket mount on the Clicgear fits over the top latch just under the brake. I was worried that it would make it harder to snap the Clicgear closed, but it was just the same.

There is also a top clip that holds the vertical support strap. I hooks over the top stays and under the green release lever. It’s a little tough to photo. You can leave the strap attached if you want.

Below is the unit on the mounting brackets.

Here is a quick video of assembly as you would do on the course. It literally takes 20 seconds. Just unclip the retainers, mount the unit and attach the strap. Make sure it has some tension but also some give for uneven ground.

Remote

The remote is a hand held unit with a wheel for acceleration and brake. The batteries were about 1/2 charged so I naturally took it for a test ride around the yard before reading the instructions! First thing I noticed is my Clicgear needs a front end alignment.

The wheel is sort of a throttle, so it won’t go full speed unless you push it all the way forward, which is smart. There are four speeds, low, mid, high and Pro. Pro should be renamed Ludicrous Speed! You will have to sprint like Usain Bolt to catch it at that speed. You get to reverse by double clicking the power button. The throttle wheel is spring loaded so if you drop the remote it will slow the cart. The brake works by reversing the wheel. It worked okay in my yard test. Reverse works fine too. I’m not sure who in their right mind would go in reverse at Pro speed.

Here is a video of using the remote.

The remote displays battery life, an odometer, speed and interestingly Max Speed. New PR!!!! This may be a bit dangerous for competitive guys on the course. 😜 Units are in kilometers per hour, so we’re metric baby!! We may be able to change that, but I’m a retired engineer and can do conversions in my head. The provided instructions for the remote only discuss charging and safety. I couldn’t find anything on the site about the remote, but I figured it out by randomly pushing buttons as engineers are want to do.

The remote will not steer the cart. It is recommended that you walk along with the cart just in front of you and keep a hand on it uphill. Many power carts have extra wheels to prevent the cart from tipping over. The Caddie Wheel does not. I’d rather have it just stay close.

Here is startup in my driveway. You can power the unit on from the remote or just push it forward or backward and the unit comes on.

I took in on the street and in my yard, which has US Open rough. It worked well unless the Caddie wheel was over a rut and elevated by the other wheels. The Velcro strap does have some give, but the rut I went over was 3-4 inches deep and in thick grass. It was easy to just push it a bit until it hit solid ground again. I repeated it again, but if the ground is uneven, just give it a little nudge.

Important tip, be careful moving the cart without a bag on it. It will move very quickly and can tip over backward. 

There are other videos on the Caddie Wheel site that show how to use the unit. 

Charging the Caddie Wheel battery 

The battery came with a half charge. I connected it to the provided charger. With the unit off, there was no indication on the battery that it was charging, but the charger has a red/green indicator.  It took about 1/2 hour to get to four bars. It is recommended to charge it in a well ventilated area. The charger is 42 volts 2.0 amps, so it has some juice. As with any large battery charging, you need to keep it in a safe area in case of issues.

Caddie Wheel Website

The website is fairly new. I think over time they should add some more instructional content to make it easy for the user to figure stuff out like remote usage, converting units, etc. Perhaps it is there now, but I wasn’t able to easily find it or it was in one of the promotional videos. It would be easier for users if there were quick videos or pdfs on these items.

Next, I will take it to the range and test it there.

 

Edited October 18 by boogielicious
Added free shipping and compatible cart information.

[boogielicious]

Couple of updates from Caddie Wheel.

Shipping is now free on all orders.

They are always adding new compatible carts. If you don’t see yours, contact them to see if your is now on the list.

It’s important to leave a little slack on the Velcro strap to help with ground contact.

[boogielicious]

I took the Caddie Wheel to a new course yesterday to test it out. It worked really well on this first try. Here are a few observations and I’ve attached a video with some demonstrations.

1. The Caddie Wheel works as advertised. It moved my Clicgear cart pretty easily through the fairway and rough. It also handled a gravel parking lot and sandy cart paths well.
2. It felt like using a powered lawn mower in a sense because you walk behind it and hold on to it in some situations like uphill or through bumpy rough.
3. You can send it ahead if you have a clear path and also bring it to you from behind. This helps when you are helping someone find their ball and you left your cart behind.
4. It will go straight if your cart is aligned. My Clicgear front wheel went out of alignment from a few days ago. I set it up to go straight on the road, but on the course it steered slightly left, which was a little annoying. I need to fix that.
5. I ended up keeping the speed at MI (medium) for most of the round. I started on low, but it would slow down on some uphills. Medium seemed to work best because you can throttle the accelerator wheel.
6. I think it is best to move the accelerator wheel ahead gradually when you start otherwise the wheel can spin out. It’s kind of like driving with your car’s accelerator.
7. Stay near the Caddie Wheel going up steeper inclines (as recommended) or it can unweight the front wheel and tip over.
8. Also, when it’s moving slowly on an incline, don’t hit brake or it will tip quickly as I learned.
9. We walked 18 (the first for me in months due to injury) and it used a little less than 1/2 of the battery in a 4.5 hour round.
10. I think the power button in the remote is a little sensitive. When I would put the remote in my back pocket, it would shut off. This is if the button what on my body side. If I put it in facing out, it stayed on. I did hang it off my cart a lot of the time, which was convenient. It has a lanyard.
11. The wheel itself has decent tread, but I wonder if it had more aggressive tread it would be even more effective. It didn’t accumulate grass clipping on this test, but the course was not recently mowed. 

Here is the video.

 

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I’m famous!  Caddy Wheel used my video on a Facebook post.

https://fb.watch/vH5Z2rLmbK/?