DTH

Cheers for the update Tinka. Just coming up to 3k miles in the first month of ownership and time for my short report. I've done 5 visits to the petrol station (thanks Tesco for the x amount off pence per litre ... the last one was 14p a litre off petrol @ £1.25 / litre which almost made it feel like 2003 again!). MPG on the on board computer has settled at 55.7 which isn't a million miles off from the receipts v mileage (in fact the paper receipts say 56.9 mpg). It's taken me two weeks to sign up to the connected services off the portal, but still don't know what benefits it brings. The re-route / avoid traffic jams off the premium nav seems to know the smartest way home anyway. Any advice on how to fully utilise this would be grateful. Thanks in advance. I've nearly run 4 people over in the last month... once taking a short cut through Moss Bank park in Bolton whilst a cricket match was under way and the players were messing around on the cut through road, putting their bags in their double parked cars .. Izzy sneaked up on 'em! The last one was in central Manchester at the weekend, dropping Mrs. Rosun off with the mother in law for some shopping, when every kind of space cadet / zombie was in town (It was gay pride day if that excuses it). Foibles remain with the RDS display. I love to play "who sung that song". What I get is ... Cameo ... Wor.. when a full screen would say ..... Cameo .... Word Up ... 1986 ... reached number 1 etc. Please Mr. Lexus, if you are reading this, then upgrade to full screen RDS. Another bug bear is the drivers side window. I'm a smoker, I spark a fag up and drop the window a couple of inches and get covered in water because there are no seams from the front / top of the window. The solution is to take a dishcloth into the car so I now have the most polished drivers control panel in GB. I'd love to know how the EURO / NCAP / MPG figures get deduced. Stick Izzy in sport and it aint 8 point whatever seconds to 60mph. More like 6 or 7 point something. She's quick. And also slippy... take your foot off the accelerator in a 'normal' car and the speed descends on a logarithmic scale ... not in the IS300h... it feels like it could accelerate uphill. I'll report back in another 5000 miles (2 months or so) with updates. Thanks forum members.

1500 miles in two weeks and the mpg now fluctuates between 57.0 - 57.3. I never thought I'd be happy tootling along in 30mph traffic jams before now!

Izzie it is ... Thanks. I've got 3 girls so she had to have a girls name. First proper run out (270 miles there and back) and the overall mpg has now stabilised at 57.3 mpg. Thank God for those 50 mph roadworks on the M1 near Sheffield. Filled her up and got 692 miles remaining on the calculator. Another run out tomorrow to Bournemouth and back .... the heady days and high life of an IT consultant eh? Thanks for all the feedback chaps. I know I've done the right thing and my hands don't stink of diesel any more. Much appreciated.

Shame I'm an Android 'boy' then. I'll give it a couple of months and I'm sure I'll get the hang of it. I'm mid 40's and in IT so too old to RTFM (Read the Flipping / F***king Manual). I just wish there was a IS300h guide for idiots out there on the internet! Any school boy errors / tips / tricks would be appreciated. Even though the old Merc was 3 years old there were certain things that they did better especially around the Sat Nav / Phone / Speech recognition (even though I'm broad Northern) / Information display, and this is me who used to have the first generation IS back in 2001 when Mercs used to rust in front of your eyes. Very impressed with the fit and finish though, I quite like the 'leather' topped dash and although the seats are thin there's a plushness to them that I hope lasts over time. I'll keep you posted on the next couple of trips. Probably in the other topics about MPG or range. One thing though .... I need a name for the young girl. Call me soft in the head but if you give a car a name it sort of makes it personal and you can put up with certain idiosyncracies... the youngest child has suggested Suzi. Any advances on Suzi?

Greetings from the original poster. Well, it's here. SE with premium nav in sonic titanium. First impressions were "Why is everything buried so deep behind the user interface?" Although after having a play with the haptic feedback on the mouse I'm not now so hit and miss. I don't like the radio, rather I don't like the radio display. I love seeing what track is playing but the screen does not seem to show the full artist and title on the DAB radio, instead half the screen is taken up with settings and presets. MPG wise, she arrived with 120 miles on the clock at an average of 56 mpg and I've doubled the mileage and managed to sneak it up to 57 mpg. It certainly draws attention in a sea of dark metallic 3-series / A4's / C-Class in the office car park! Many thanks for all your help since the turn of the year in making me make the right choice

I averaged out at 33mpg over the 7 years I had my IS200SE. Sounds bad but the flip side was that nothing went wrong in those 7 years (apart from a side light bulb blew). Factor in the lack of any repairs and they are one economical car. (The driving mix was probably 80% motorway @ 80 mph / 20% town crawling). Hope this is of use.

One other thing that is confusing me. If I opt for the Sat Nav I get a reversing camera, right? Therefore I don't need parking sensors. I usually hit things when reversing rather than when going forwards so a rear camera would be ideal. And what is SE spec cloth like? Is it half leather / half cloth? Velour like? The local dealer never has an SE in the showroom or any on PDI that I can check over. Thanks again people. This is one really friendly forum.

Many thanks for all the responses. Still undecided on colours / options to specify. Are there any must have options to spec on an SE? Slightly disappointed that one cannot spec leather / auto wipers on an SE. It seems that Lexus might be missing a trick here as a few colleagues are attracted by the low company car tax rate but turned off by the goodies that are not available.

Thanks for all the responses. I think my mind is made up and it'll be an IS300h SE with Nav and parking sensors that gets ordered. I've managed to blag an extended test drive (3 days) and so long as it's not a million miles away from my current mpg (53.3 mpg over the last 70,000 miles) then I'll order one. Anybody got any colour suggestions or should I let my wife choose?

Thanks Blisteringblue and all you other respondents. I totally forgot about the diesel v petrol discrepancy pence per mile fandango. No doubt HMRC will be looking to close the loophole in the near future so I might as well fill my boots while it lasts. I can see what the leasing companies are up to as well, providing higher than benchmarked (for the P11d values) quotations but then putting the onus on the company car tax payer to pay less tax. Doing the sums here the Lexus works out approximately £50-£100 per month cheaper than equivalents from BMW / Merc / Audi although the initial wooden dollars (lease cost) extracted from the salary sacrifice are significantly higher (£80 - £120 per month more). I've got one coming on a three day demo so I'll see how I get on comparing like for like and will keep you informed. Once again, many thanks to all. Your input and comments are really appreciated.

Thanks for all the feedback. Much appreciated.

Ex IS200SE owner (2001 - 2007) who took the diesel dollar / company car tax option of a diesel instead of the 'take the cash' option when the IS clicked over to 165,000 miles when all that went wrong was a blown sidelight bulb. Daft / Crazy ... yeah I know. So, the lease on the current company car (Mercedes C220 CDi - the company car tax efficient one .. 109 CO2 kg/something?) is due to be returned in June. I've done the sums of cash v company car and as I live in area where crash for cash (OL11) is considered a skilled occupation, the sums (down payment + tyres + batteries + exhausts +servicing + insurance + 40k miles per annum) tend to make me favour taking the car instead of the cash. I've driven the IS300h for about 2 hours and was very impressed, but can someone who runs one day in day out, putting say 100 miles a day on it vouch for its real world MPG / livability. Especially hacking up and down a motorway for 80% of its life. Many thanks in advance of all the responses.

The belt change was about £300. The all up cost of the service was £1100. That included 2 new tyres a 90k service new front discs / pads / calipers. I managed to get the rear discs / pads done for free as they had corroded from being replaced a year earlier. This was done at Lexus Stockport and no they were not my pictures. Hope this helps.

Sandeep, I went through the 90k barrier earlier this month. The ball joints went on mine at circa 70k from new. Can I offer some advice? ...... get the timing belt done now. Don't wait for the 100k service interval. Mine was shot to pieces and was hanging on by a thread at 90k.

If you're using the headlight washers these are particularly thirsty.