RC 200t

colin saunders · May 22, 2023

Hi

Looking for a RC 200t to possibly test drive or be a passenger in. I live in Carmarthenshire but would travel.

Thanks Col

Linas.P · May 24, 2023

Your best bet is to actually look for traders that are selling them... there is one in Leicester and one North of London, I think that is closest you can get (the 3rd one is Edinburg)... I do not believe anyone on the forum currently owns one... there are few IS200t, but I don't believe anyone has RC200t. And even historically maybe only 2-3 people on here had it. One should be lurking somewhere in Birmingham as I know the guy that I sold mine to was trying to sell it for nearly 9 months and I doubt he managed to sell it in the end...so that one may re-appear at some time again.

Other option - try RC300h, because many Lexus dealers still have them, it is still mostly the same car and you may even be able to get 24h test drive, so you could better "understand" things that are in common between RC300h and 200t, so when you finally get into 200t you can focus just on the engine and gearbox alone. As well maybe try IS200t (Lexus Bristol has one), again you may be able to convince them for 24h test drive... now sure IS is quite different car from RC, it rides differently on 18" vs 19" wheels... it has better fuel economy and it is more responsive (smaller wheels, lighter car, narrower tyres), but you can still figure out few things between trying RC300h and IS200t... but finding RC200t to try will be rather difficult and to be fair... even if you go for test drive, understanding the car in 15 minutes with sales guy on the side is rather difficult.

colin saunders · May 24, 2023

Many thanks for your input.

I'm interested in the one in Scotland because of the colour and interior combination. Any particular reason why there are so few available? The engine/gearbox?

Col

Linas.P · May 24, 2023

I think Lexus only sold something like 120 of them, so they are just rare.

As to why they didn't sell... yes I guess engine was big contributing factor. Basically 300h was a "compliance" model as up to 2018 you could buy one as company car under "salary sacrifice scheme" (under 149g co2/km), so I think quite a few were bought as company cars, still rare but nowhere near as rare, 200t obviously didn't comply with this scheme and it wasn't very competitive overall. It was more expensive than 300h to buy, and to tax (£20 vs £240), it was more expensive than comparable BMW 420i (closer to the price of much faster 430i)... overall it just wasn't very competitive. And again - whereas 300h is just simply slow, it has some positive angles to it. 200t just doesn't really have anything that stands out, the only reason to get it 200t instead of 300h is because it is faster, but it is not sufficiently faster to justify the extra cost... people who actually wanted faster car just bought BMW 430i... somehow 430i manages 5.5s from similar 2L turbo petrol, which as well has similar power (255hp vs. 241hp)... it is just kind of baffling that Lexus is whole 2 seconds slower with just 14hp difference.

The colour combo is personal choice of course, but the one in Edinburg has that horrible standard audio system (as can be seen by the rotary dial next to gear leaver). It sounds absolutely horrendous, so I would avoid it for that reason alone. Although it seems all 3 of them have standard audio, so there isn't much of the choice at the moment.

If I were you I honestly would wait a bit if you really want RC200t. Yes there are few of them, but there are even fewer people who looking for one, so when they come for sale they tend to stay on sale for very long. I am quite certain it is possible to get much better example for ~£16-18k than what is currently on offer.

Now for sure I would not recommend it, but I am not going to repeat myself 🙂

Lex_1988 · May 24, 2023

Looks wise, the RC is a proper head turner, especially in the sonic red and canary yellow.

That said, apparently the gearbox on the 200t is a laggy mess. Perhaps that's why in reality it's only 0.3-0.5 of a second quicker to 60 than the 300h.

The 300h is pretty nice on winding roads and around town in sport mode, it's just the motorway overtakes which make the engine sound like a wailing chewbacca. Plus side 45mpg is the norm from most trips. Doubt the 200t will do anything close to that.

Linas.P · May 24, 2023

31 minutes ago, Lex_1988 said:

0.3-0.5

It is little bit faster than that, probably ~7.2s vs ~8.6s. But say 0-30 there will be nothing in between them. I had it side by side with IS250 mk2 and IS250 stayed in front all the way to 40-50. But IS250 in reality gets 7.6-7.8 0-60, so there is not much in between them anyway and even at 60MPH IS250 is maybe a car length behind. Obviously, if you continue accelerating from 50, then 200t would be significantly ahead of both 300h and 250, but under 50 it really doesn't want to go.

The lag from the stand still is ridiculous on RC200t... literally takes 1 second from when you press accelerator and the car actually start moving, so I think that is what contributes the most to overall poor performance. Then you get to the point where it just constantly changes gears... and only around 50 starts pulling quite decently.

Regarding MPG - yes RC200t you are very lucky to see mid-30s on motorway, or mid-20s in the city. My average was something like 22-24MPG combined over like 8000 miles and I mostly did longer trips when I owned it.

Jgtcracer · May 25, 2023

13 hours ago, Linas.P said:

It is little bit faster than that, probably ~7.2s vs ~8.6s. But say 0-30 there will be nothing in between them. I had it side by side with IS250 mk2 and IS250 stayed in front all the way to 40-50. But IS250 in reality gets 7.6-7.8 0-60, so there is not much in between them anyway and even at 60MPH IS250 is maybe a car length behind. Obviously, if you continue accelerating from 50, then 200t would be significantly ahead of both 300h and 250, but under 50 it really doesn't want to go.

The lag from the stand still is ridiculous on RC200t... literally takes 1 second from when you press accelerator and the car actually start moving, so I think that is what contributes the most to overall poor performance. Then you get to the point where it just constantly changes gears... and only around 50 starts pulling quite decently.

Regarding MPG - yes RC200t you are very lucky to see mid-30s on motorway, or mid-20s in the city. My average was something like 22-24MPG combined over like 8000 miles and I mostly did longer trips when I owned it.

That fuel economy really is rough, I’m getting 21-23mpg average in the RCF. I really struggle to understand how it’s that bad, physics shouldn’t allow it!

Is the engine used in other cars?

Linas.P · May 25, 2023

I had RC-F for a spin and honestly I was getting better fuel economy in RC-F than I did in RC200t... and for what? RC-F is at least a genuinely fast and fun to drive car, sounds great... makes you forget the price of the fuel, but for RC200t it was totally unacceptable.

Yes - it is used in all Lexus 200t and outside of Europe it is called 300 i.e. RC300 in US = RC200t in UK. I know that IS200t is ~10% better on fuel, I assume because it has smaller narrower wheels and is generally lighter car (would not want to know what NX/RX200t does). As well I did have Brigestone Potenza RE050a on the car and they are rated F for Fuel, I potentially with better tyres the MPG would have been better, but RE050a are what the car came with from factory and I doubt it would be really noticeable... maybe 1-2MPG better with the most economic tyres there are. As well 265 on the rear is way way over the top for 241HP car.