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Happy birthday to my wee RX400H - 12 years old today and still goes like a dream.......

less toys and gimmicks on the Ls400 and therefor less to go wrong one perceives ! If you get a good Ls430 with all the known issues sorted, or better still, get one that needs the issues sorted coz then you will know they have been done by yourself, then you will have a brilliant car that will cost you a fraction of your Audi S3 to maintain and will last you for very many incredibly comfortable and reliable motoring years There's a mountain of useful info on this forum, just delve into it ........ all participants here would recommend your move to here AND Welcome Malc

When we got an NX in white with the black glass roof, I was astonished at the temperature difference between the white and black parts after a spell in the sun. The black becomes untouchably hot while the white is pleasantly warm.

This comes under "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" the only thing I like is the car. I do not like green on any car to the point where it would put me off buying any car if it were green. I agree the slammed look is also not for me, but this is probably an age thing. I am also not a lover of black cars, but this is not down to the actual look, but more to do with the impossibility of keeping one clean, and the car being so hot in the sun. John.

Again the choice is yours,for me reliability comes first except you have a deep pocket

Then maybe it's time to rectify that motoring error!

This LS430 looks nice https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Lexus-LS430-2002-Premium-Package/223939309126?hash=item3423d2ae46:g:PfoAAOSw8wheY~Ef

LS430, for me as newer and more goodies. Never had or driven either though. James.

I originally started looking at the LS430 which was the model that fired my interest. But after researching and looking, I decided that the LS400 was the one for me for the same reason, classic looks etc. If you decide on the LS400 then buying a 'good' one could be a challenge, to reiterate the very sound advice from 'Cotswold Pete' - give the rear arches a good poke with screwdriver, this is a weak rust point. I can 100% testify to this with my car and didn't know this could be an issue when I was looking for one. I did a post about my buying experience, link below, which may help you in your search for a LS400 - if that's what you decide.

Bought them at ECP try putting in your vin number

Do not be put off using a solar charger. The versions that are suitable for use in a car have only a very small output usually below one amp, and come with the correct size cable ready fitted. A 100 watt 8.5 amp panel would be as big as the roof of the car, and unless used with a charge controller would over charge the battery. The output of the solar chargers is usually given in watts, but dividing the watts by 12 will give a good approximation of the number of amps the panel is capable of in bright sunshine. The panels are also diode isolated meaning you can leave it connected to the car. It is not difficult to bypass the cigar lighter relay to make it permanently live if you cannot find another suitable permanent live feed "try foot well lights". If you do go down this route buy a panel with a minimum of 10 watts output, but do not go over 30 watts, and try to arrange for it to point south out of shade. The higher the wattage the larger the panel gets. John.

My experience is 430 is a lot more luxurious, the rear passenges have more room, but it feels more 'enclosed' compared to 400, more like sitting in an aircraft where you cannot see over the seat in front. On pricng £5K to £6K will get you a sorted 430, that should be less trouble, though the air suspension will get you forking out at some point. My 400 for two new front shocks was £700(ish) fitted, a lot cheaper than 430. If looking at 400s, give the rear arches a good poke with screwdriver, this is a weak rust point. The 400 has stainless exhaust, and apart from Y-piece repairs should last forever. Also best to drive one or two of each model to get a feel, and try not to jump at the first one and aim for a Mk4 with the 400 (not sure which is best 430 to go for, my mates early facelift model seems like a fair buy at £6K, with around 68K on clock).

Where is our old friend Herbie ? He would be a whizz on this subject! I hope he is not suffering with CV19.

my experience after buying original Lexus / Toyota rubbers for decades ( 2 in fact ) I found the last set had a very limited lifespan, less than a year for sure ........... they used to last 2/3 years and 20/30k miles I think the reason for this is simply age related ............ original rubbers, kept on the shelf since year 2000 or so might actually deteriorate prematurely in their packs I'm guessing my size might only fit my car / Ls400s I'm now just using the cheapy rubbers that my indy puts on every year or more ( slightly ) and cost about £8 a set from his factor Malc

Horses for courses, both brilliant cars. I've had both and each has an advantage over the other. I disagree that the 430 is less comfortable, I think it's more comfortable plus much more space for rear passengers. Try them both and you'll be able to make your own mind up.

I think the replacements are rubber. You can tell if you still have original ones, as they’ve got Japanese writing by the clip. Hope this helps. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Click on the "Lexus owner Reviews" seen under the Sub forum above. Should give you an indication of what you want to know.

Welcome to Europe's Leading Lexus Club! Please Enjoy!

I like the green although I'm really not sold on the suspension

Hi Toby, yes it's plug and play. My car is a 2006 just like yours. If you get the MVA-13LE on a later model, it's plug and play but if you want the audio door to close neatly, with some head units, there's a little bit of crafting to do. I did mine a few years ago by adapting an imported US MVA-13L before they made the 'E' version and there was some minor wiring work to do but it works just fine. My audio set up is modified so much I could dispense with the Beat-Sonic interface now. If you look in the long build thread on LW there's a fair bit of detail.

This is what I bought,think they are rubber and not silicone but not 100 sure

x3 on the Yaris. That would be my daily driver and I'm imagining pairing it with a Nissan 370z convertible in Black Rose. I've never had a convertible, nor a V6, so that would tick 2 new boxes. The Yaris could be a pleasant throwback to my 5 Impreza Turbos, WRXs and STIs

Thank you so much for the advice!!! Here is my response to Lexus Carlisle  Good morning Dougie I called yesterday, not sure if you got the message. Lexus Glasgow informed me that you are not prepared to cover the cost of investigation and repair (if not covered by the extended warranty) as you have spent too much on the car already I am very concerned that this is the case for a water ingress (in exactly the same area) that was reported within 2 weeks of original purchase and has not been rectified Spending too much money on a car does not absolve from your legal responsibility if you do not fix the water ingress I will reject the car Regards Colin

After a full term as a police officer I think that the policing in certain areas leaves much to be desired. Always any crime with a home Invasion especially a domestic burglary at night(to steal the transponder) immediately attracted a hefty prison sentence. This is not a victimless crime. Cheltenham race week night shift would involve recording the registration numbers of every car in every hotel and public car park resulting in recovery of quite a few stolen cars and cars used by travelling criminals and some very good arrests. Often these high performance stolen cars are used in serious crime by ruthless criminals. The trouble is the 'Snowflake' Police would rather prosecute 'Facebook' crime because its easy to get good detection rates and we all know that modern society loves a good graph or spreadsheet A lack of resources is trotted out as an excuse but the police deal with far less onerous tasks today than 40 or even 15 years ago. When did you last see a Blunkett Bobby on the beat. In my area probably not for at least 5 years, but you see them pretending to be real police in pairs in vehicles all the time..... Rant over. 🌼🌼🌼

Thank you very much! Just spoken to him and getting back to him with the model number.

I had the rear reclining massage seats in my other Celsior but found them impossible to use..... couldn’t reach the pedals or the steering wheel. 😀

Thanks all. No, it's a used one - it's a 4th gen, pre-facelift. It's the only pre-facelift I've ever seen in the UK with the LED headlights rather than the Xenons. We went through a long process of selecting a replacement for the V70. We used to have just the one car, and there's not many cars that can match the V70 for doing everything (wafty cruise, practical load lugging, etc), but petrol V70s all come in at £500+ tax. However, last year we got the Leaf which does my commute and popping to the shops and I'm using to carry stuff when needed. The mileage dropped on the V70 and we started to look about for something a bit special to replace it (and get away from diesel). We looked at BMW and Mercedes (E-class coupe was favourite on paper) but came away very disappointed with the interior quality (look fantastic in pictures, cheap and nasty plastics to the touch), the comfort (awful seats in the E coupe, better in the saloon) and finding a petrol BMW or merc with standard (ie not sports, M-sport, AMG-line) suspension and electric seats was a proper needle in a haystack job. The only cars that impressed were the GS (and we were much more impressed with the NX in person than on paper, we liked the RX as well) and the Tesla S (which was only driven because I was interested - out of reach for now, and having now sat in a model 3 in the USA I'd prefer a 3). Husband isn't quite on board with having both cars electric (yet...) though. The more I learned about the engineering of the GS (I'm an engineer), the more impressed I became. The way that the Power Split Device in the Hybrid Synergy Drive works is such a beautifully elegant bit of engineering and it really appealed to me. It overcomes so many of the real problems of auto transmissions. It's interesting reading the reviews of the GS hybrids in the motoring press. As an EV driver I've long since come to the view that the motoring press are mostly clarksonesque dinosaur petrolheads who can't cope with change. Most of the complaints around the GS hybrid transmission come down to "the car makes a droning noise at full throttle" - see the Fifth Gear test for a good example of that. In the real world though you accelerate hard for only a few seconds. They all seem to miss the myriad advantages of the smoothness of acceleration (much more akin to an EV), lack of wearing parts like clutches or auto fluid, the lack of kickdown lag or turbolag (which is the main reason that my Leaf is quicker in the real world than most ICE cars around town - fast acceleration isn't much good if you have to wait a second to get to it as the car gets into the right gear and builds boost) and the ability of the GS450h to gear right down to ~1k rpm @ 100mph (there's an autobahn video that shows this). In other words, as far as I can tell from the engineering and my experience, the "e-CVT" (and half of their problems are down to calling it that) is actually pretty much superior to any other mechanical transmission in terms of driving characteristics, it's just the noise that people focus on. Drive with ear defenders on in two different cars and they'd come to a different conclusion. Way back in the late 90s my father was buying a new car (and I was in my late teens, just learning to drive). Even then the disparity between what the motoring press said and the reality was quite plain. My father's shortlist was the 7 series, A8, S-class, XJ8 and LS400 - the press loved the A8 and the XJ8 at the time. The S was the first to fall (the grosserwagen W140 was just too big, and needed the 5 litre to move (I should explain, my father had previously owned an S-type 3.8, Rover P6 3500 V8 and an XJ12 5.3 at various times - he demanded a certain level of performance)). The XJ8 was next, as the interior belied the car's very dated roots with a cramped cabin, short seat squabs and shallow boot. The A8 went down next as it was stupid - the 4.2 quattro was epically quick, but the ride and seats involved more concrete than compliance (fine for a sports car, not a luxury saloon). In the end it came down to the magical LS400 and the BMW 7 - in the end of the cars that were available at the time he went for a 740iL 4.4 as the mk4 LS400 was a bit out of reach and the mk3 was a bit off what the BMW was. However, the quality and experience of the Lexus always stuck with me. We did drive a 2nd gen GS300 at the time also. I think the 4th gen GS is a car he would have liked - it's also the same colour as his BMW was. Shahpor - I thought someone would be watching. It is the latter of the cars you mention. We saw yours on sale also - we've been keeping a close eye on them since July.

Point well made, Just looked through techdoc3 and found the following:- "automatic headlight beam level control system (models with LED headlights only)"

CT 200h Premier's have full LED beam headlights not Xenon and do not have auto leveling. Level of the headlight is controlled via adjustments behind the headlamp units as with Halogen. Hope this helps!

Not a great start 😔 - Drive back home was uneventful, M23 - M25 and then lanes. Parked car on drive and went in front door. Dog wanted to go out, so opened back door and let him out. As I went to follow I tripped over a low level flood barrier, both wrists and knees took full impact of fall onto brickwork. Upshot was that both knees swollen to size of large oranges and have been unable to get about much till today. Nothing broken just swelling and stiffness. The plan is to see how knees are on Saturday, if ok then I should be able to get to use it 😀