Big Problem With My Is200.. Helpp!

[TUBBY-IS200]

HI.

I got my lexus 3 months ago, and it has been a pleasure to drive and NEVER given me any sort of problem, apart from the petrol consumption as im only 22 and had a jump from a 1.4 to a lexus is200 2.0 sport. Anyway, last week monday evening i jumped in the car and was going out for a drive with family, and suddenly the car just started jerking and kind of like jumping forwards, and the car had lost all of its power. The car on a normal basis is pretty quick but since this jerking started and a weird sound was coming like some kind of metal scraping together, the car has gone into a weird form. When stationery the car revs itself to about 2500rpm every 5 seconds or so, and when driving it doesnt have half the power to be honest, and i give it ful throttle and the car picks up very slowly and the speed seems to be limited, the petrol is dissapearing as well, as i've put in £30 on the monday and have done about 35 miles which has been driving to garages ONLY and then home again, and the petrol is now empty.(drinking much more petrol then it should be) The EML came on, so i got a diagnostic test done, and 2 things came up 1. throttle body and 2. 02 Sensor. i replaced both immediately as family is in the jap parts car trade, but the problem is still there. I decided to try another throttle body as maybe the one i replaced it with could be faulty as well, but the problem was still there. I replaced the coil pack as well as someone advised that, but still no luck. Now i've been to several garages and had the diagnostics done, and the same problem comes up continuously, but nobody knows what else it could possibly be. Being a student at university, there is only so much i can afford, and so far i've spend £500 trying to fix the problem, but no1 seems to know what the problem is. The EML went off for 1 day, and is now back on again, and now the traction control keeps flashing on the dash. I really am clueless as to what to do, as every garage i go to charges for the diagnostics and replaces throttle body, but the problem persists. I have changed it 3 times now, and the car has visited so many garages, but no1 can help me, and they just say they dont know what it is.

1 of the guys asked me if i put the correct petrol in, which i am certain i did, but cant remember for sure.

can anyone please help me or point me in the right direction to a recognised specialist who has reasonable prices, or possibly if you know what it could be, or have experienced the same thing. Your help would be very much appreciated

here is a link to my cars pictures if u wish to see

http://s589.photobucket.com/albums/ss338/t...0IS200%20Sport/

[Anuj]

hi mate, if u can not remember for certain regarding the fuel, then i recommend the next step is to get ure tank drained.

does the car start well after its been left off?

[TUBBY-IS200]

hi mate, if u can not remember for certain regarding the fuel, then i recommend the next step is to get ure tank drained.

does the car start well after its been left off?

yes, the car starts straight away, without any delay at all

[Abbas]

Sorry to hear this, I hope you get your IS back on the road asap...

Have you tried going to a Lexus dealer? It may work out more cost effective than keeping replacing parts without solving the problem.

Quick search brought this place up http://www.westfieldmotors.co.uk/index.php Its in Essex but I have no idea what they are like but they claim to be Lexus specialist.

Good luck.

[doctor1986]

how many miles has the have done so far?

does the metal scrapping sound coming from the front or in the middle of the car?

[TUBBY-IS200]

how many miles has the have done so far?

does the metal scrapping sound coming from the front or in the middle of the car?

thanks abbas, and the metal scraping comes from the middle

[Asi]

sounds like the cat is needing to be replaced?

engine light on mate?

[TUBBY-IS200]

sounds like the cat is needing to be replaced?

engine light on mate?

engine light is on yes... but could all the symptoms mean the cat needs replacing???

[lexdavis]

not sure but if in doubt take it to a lexus specialist as sometimes they might no something that isnt common knowledge.

[dandydons]

Had similar symtoms in a rav4 before - suspected it was the cat converter but turned out was the crankshaft position sensor or rather the wire had burned through - check all your wiring and see if anyone can have a look at crankshaft sensor -if not maybe it is the cat. I had a long letter from the AA about it cos they diagnosed the cat - which was wrong but apparently symtoms are the same. Obviously wiring at crank shaft sensor was easy fix and cheap. - Maybe take it to a toyota dealer rather than lexus and mention above ?

[TUBBY-IS200]

it could may well be the cat, because there is a noise that iv heard at times from the middle of the car and its like something rattling, very much like an exhaust shield or something along those lines. Somebody i know who has a good experience in repairing cars said to me this morning that it could be the Idle Air Control Valve. Going to get that done today at 4pm and hope for some good news..

[TUBBY-IS200]

jus got bak from the garage. And replaced the Idle air control valve, but no luck once again. after leaving the garage with my car, the brakes seized whilst driving and the car turned off itself and now it doesnt start all, the timing belt spins when turning the ignition but the car doesnt spark up now, this car seems to have major issues and i'v now lost hope

[Steve ( West Mids )]

I fear you have been throwing money at it and taking advice of people who don't really know the cause. If you can get it started take it to a Lexus dealer for diagnostics, then decide what you are going to do next.

[sparkystav]

what were the exact codes from the obd?

Is the timing belt right? it hasnt slipped or anything?

[flyeris]

what were the exact codes from the obd?

Is the timing belt right? it hasnt slipped or anything?

I have no idea, how cat converter could relate to his problems? There are plenty of people driving catless systems perfectly fine without any symptoms. Mine is also "worn out" and it doesn't affect the driving in any way. Of course, emissions are probably worse right now than they should be.

[lexynik]

its only a thought but is it possible the cat has totally collapsed and is blocking the exhaust preventing the car from starting ? this is only something that came to my mind when reading this thread-im probably wrong but its worth a thought as cat was suspect- as suggested lexus would be the place to go,sorry i couldnt be more help its horrible in that kind of situation

[deckie77]

I feel for you mate, i really do, i am leaning towards Stavs shout about timing being out, but i would have thought that after being round all those garages one of them surely checked this???

As for the cat, i do not buy this as if it had failed alltogether the internal of the cat would start to come apart and give you lots of smoke and a burning smell out the exhaust. (i'm no tech but my fathers cat fell apart inside just last month, this killed the power a bit, but caused no real probs except more emmisions, exhaust smoke & burning smell)

Where's Ormi when you need him????? he's maybe heard of this before???

[fil4362]

Lambda sensor/ oxygen sensor theres 3 on the is wich one did you change? theres a sensor after the cat wich will detect if the cats working properly or not thats its only job. If the front sensor is lazy it will/could cause the engine to idle high then low as it constanly cycles from rich to lean (properly working it cycles very fast and doesnt affect idle speed.) the cat needs emissions from rich and lean mix to work correctly and as such switches the fuel mix accordingly.

A cat can colapse and block an exhaust they are a very fine honeycomb inside and can easily block. they usualy colapse and rattle but could still block the exhaust. A car with a de cat may not show a fault as the cat actually does very little to lower emissions only lowering the out put by the last 0.2% aprox.

You said you changed the coil pack ?? theres 6 on the Lexus and there not cheap either. did you change all six??. stop guessing pal get it plugged in properly and get a proper diagnosis. I been a mechanic all my working life and have suggested what it could be With out seeing the motor dont take my advice for fact. Show me the car i diag it in 5 mins. Save some money get it diagnosed properly every diag kit i have is mobile so if it still doesnt run get someone to come to you.

[fil4362]

Just to add the trc light comes on when the ecu decides the engine has a "bad" fault and cuts in the trc to limit your engine power to reduce engine revs to stop you doingit more harm when driving it home. Dont know what Lexus call this but most manufacturers call it "limp home mode" its really a restricted power mode just to get you home or to nearest garage anyway.

[akhtar1817]

I would be inclined to check the coil packs, like the fella above me mentioned, they aint cheap, I had a similar problem last year, EML came on, TC on \ of randomly, had a car diagnostic kit at home, hooked it up, and the issue turned out to be coil packs, tested by swapping coil pack 1,3 (suspected problem) with 2,5

cleared error codes, tested again and it showed 2,5 as errors, £160 for the coil packs, swapped them out, and has been fine ever since.

May well be something else but it sounds almost identical to the issue I had, with the excessive fuel consumption etc..

[Monster-Mat]

TRAC is not applied during limp mode, the ecu just prevents the car from running normally, the TRAC light indicates that there is a fault

id say you have done more damage driving the car around in limp mode, than the original issue which caused the limp home mode.

id suggest as Stav mentioned that the metalic noise was the tensioner failing and the belt may have jumped a tooth, its also likely that the cat has now failed due to over heating due to running in limp mode for a long period.

limp home mode is just that....limp home

[fil4362]

Like i mentioned i or no one else can diagnose a fault from our arm chairs so what ever the fault were all guessing of what might be wrong best thing to do is get it plugged in and stop fitting parts that may or may not fix it.

I recently towed collected a car from a local garage to mine. they had the car for a month and had fitted all sorts of stuff idle control valves throttle position sensors crank sensors. By the time i got it i couldnt work out what had been done and not done. Fixed it now well last week actually, turned out to be a set of plugs that started all the problems. Car was idleing a little lumpy would suddenly jumped 2000 rpm and engine temp warning light came on.

The plugs had a hugh gap causing resistance in the coils making them work harder one eventually popped (and replaced with a real cheap one) this then inturn cause a spike in the ecu and blew that as well. so there was 8 fault codes in the ecu as one of the control chips had burnt out. New ecu (free running one that gets round having to reprogramed) 4 new coils and a set of plugs, runs sweat as a nut now.

Just to point out my pals is200 had a lamdba sensor fault in november last year. I fitted a new one no problem (front sensor). He rang me last week as the light had come back on and as he works near Lexus stockport called in and had it plugged in again. Front lambda sensor they told him. So saturday i got his car in to replaced the failed sensor (dodgey part not my fault). Turns out Lexus had taken it out to "clean it" to see if it fixed the fault. They some how managed to cross thread it and i had a hell of a job geting it out. In the end i had to remove the manifold and after tryign to retap the thread cut out the threads and welded in a threaded collar i took of a scrap cat i had in my workshop. refitted manifold with new sensor mmmmm light didnt go out when started up. So pluged in again and just reset light. i didnt bother to check the codes as Lexus said what the fault was.

Strange,,,, yesturday the eml came one again. After a phone call to me he took it back to Lexus guess what its the second sensor thats gone now funny isnt it. In my opinion it was the second one on the first place and my graft saturday was a waste of time. Can i or my mate proove it ?? no bloody chance. Thats my luck out i guess for trusting some one elses diagnostics. So anyone want a front Lambda sensor full working order you cant screw it into your manifold though its got no threads.

Moral of both stories get your car fixed at a reputable garage that knows what they are doing and dont start guessing.

[TUBBY-IS200]

hmmm. today the guy opened the engine out and discovered some of the vavles were chipped and cracked and broken. Lucky for me my father is in the jap car trade, and rather then repairing this engine or rebuilding it, i am replacing the engine with another 1, with low mileage. I should have it all sorted and up and running by next week. This has been the most depressing time in my lifee, honestly, loll. Its not costing me much either for the engine, and labour isn't to bad either. But thanks for ur comments n advice guys, jus going to swap the wheels over tomorrow to the normal wheels so that while it sits in the garage car park, no1 can nick the new wheels.. will update u guys and possible get pics of the engine swap

[fil4362]

Got your mail today Matt will sort out my end tomorrow. Expect A knock from post man early next week

[doctor1986]

sounds like the cat is needing to be replaced?

engine light on mate?

engine light is on yes... but could all the symptoms mean the cat needs replacing???

if that is the case have you got your clutch cheked out. if you have high rev it is possible that gearbox and clutch is not disconnecting and therefore you get high revs and jerking could be the reason of clutch is holding to your gear box and letting go again.

worth a while to get it checked.