Cotswold Pete

Agree with others, the 400 was designed to have the right amount of tyre wall between the rim and the road, and with good tyres you get the best ride to road holding you can get (IMHO). My local mechanic says more customers with low profile tyres are having to replace one of more rims at 5 or so years, due to out of true rims thanks; to the Kiss of The Pothole. Maybe if you are still keen, see if you can get someone to photo-shop your car with modded wheels, because if you like the look, then thats good by me. I do like the look of some of the modded LS I have seen, it's just I prefer original stylee, but then I run a 40 year old record deck and still like having the cassette in the LS, jsut so I can listen to cassettes. One reason moving up to a 460 would be a downgrade🤣

Crickey, that is madness, you really have to be in love with the car to do that. Reminds me a bit of a sales manager I used to work with who bought an E-type in the 80s, and would take it to shows, but it never got top marks, because unlike other enthusiasts he would not jack it up after every run and clean the whole lot down so that it looked factory fresh. (as Dizzee Rascal would sing - BONKERS) I say do enough to keep an LS on the road, and make it a little harder for the tin mice to get going, but they will always find a spot somewhere to have their lunch, but hopefully not a 3 course meal. You should see the sills on my wifes XJ, 13 years old, looks like a right old Roman Banquet been had by the mice, and with recent re-weld, we know that in 3 years time (due to the odd design of the drains) the mice will have been sated once more.

Best car you'll ever buy is an LS, and the Mk4 is a great car.

Bob, I bought my first LS400 at the tender age of 50, up to then had been Vauxhall driver (and sometime Peugeot - never again) Quite a few of my mates (and others) thought I had bought a drug dealers car (though at the time the local smack-head dealer was still in a Carlton - not sure what the local dealer is driving now, other than I wish someone would put them out of business). Mostly I had (and still get), how can you afford to run such a big car. However nothing like the response you got from your 'family'. I would say having worked in Germany and a fair few Germans, most of them drove BMW mainly (as far as I could tell) because their dads drove BMW as did their grandads etc. In places like Belgium, Luxembourg they found it strange I drove a Vauxhall Omega (to them they were the pimps car), so many be it is a cultural thing. Seems like someone will always put a cultural label on a car, so just enjoy it, and maybe if they see how mcuh money you really save over time and how nice the car is, their minds will change.

Without MOT to your satisfaction I would walk away. Even if MOT fine, the Control Arms can still be in need of replacement. My Mk3 needed both front arms done but got through 2 MOTs without failing, on them, I was happy to live with the slight vibration that it had (189K on clock). Bigger issue with Mk3 for me was the stalling after 15 miles or more. Was for sure the ECU capacitor problem, but got rid of car for spares and went for Mk4. Having said that I spent no money on the Mk3 for the 5 years I had it, so was a bargain car to run.

Do you not need to be married to a Getty to be able to run such large beasts. By the way did anyone watch Trust on the BBC last year, how tight was the Original JP Getty!

Longevity is a problem, and I can only wonder if in 50 years time on Car S.O.S there will some attempt to restore an LS, but it will be a short program invovling a quick rub down with a cloth, replace the water reservoir float indicator, check the boot seal, the filler cap, the cam belt and waterpump and then hand it back to the owner. This would leave the rest of the program to wonder whether it is worth restoring a 1993 Alfa Romeo GTV. I'll be up in heaven (maybe) watching Even More 4 (or whatever it will be called).

At this time of year sounds like a battery on it's way out, just take it to local battery specialist, and get them to load test. (or if you have homestart get the local breakdown boys out) Only other thing that it might be is I recall seeing post in the past about boot light on syndrome, cannot recall exact details, and may have not even been the LS forum, but something along the lines of the boot is shut, the light thinks it's open. If it is that one way to prove is remove the boot light.

Looks like my Mk3 LS 400 when I discovered a couple of gallons in the tyre well. So damp it was condensing. If it is the seal then from my experience you should look where the boot lock is and see if you have drips runnning down into tyre well (and attendant rust mark), if so the seal is the problem. It seems as if in palces the seal dries out, the water wicks over the metal ridge and works it way down inside of seal to the lowest (or where seal join is) usually near lock. If the seal has gone it is not always possible to pull on bits of seal to see if nay is loose, as it does not take much of the seal to break down to allowing wicking over the metal ridge. If the tyre well is fine, then look either side of boot where rear wheel arch corrosion will start allowing water in. This is more of a pain to deal with. Of course you could have a hole cover that is gone, so take all the boot furniture out and have a darned good look, whatever the problem is should be pretty obvious given that condensation in photo. Best of luck

With mine it was corrosion in both arches, rigt from where the arch meets the boot floor, through to the sills by the passenger door. I only noticed as I had steamy windows and knew my boot seal was fine, and then found water by the SatNav unit, and on the other side. At first I thought it was a tiny hole, but prodding with a screwdriver revealed a right old load of rust. Top of the arch was fine, but I assume this holds less mud and crud to cause problems. So take off wheel and prod with a bradawl or small screwdriver.

I assume a 93 would not have VSC on, so not sure how it would drive in Swedish winters. (unless different spec to UK) When I was looking for a Mk4, had a reply from one Finnish owner who used his all year round no problems. ECU on earlier models do seem to be more of a problem. My Mk4 only 19 years old, but do not appear to be suffering same issues I had with ECU in previous Mk3. Some parts seem to have gone up by a fair % over last few years, and with a 26 year old 155K miles, I would think the control arms would have been replaced before now, if not then a larger bill coming your way some time soon. Also I would have thought the more expensive petrol the cheaper V8s get. I bought my first LS in 2008, the recession was kicking in, price of fuel was going up, price of big cars dropping. it was a no brainer for me. LS wil lalways be the cheapest car I have ever run, until I give it up and just use a bus pass to get around (not too many years now!!!)

If you have water in the spare well, then that is coming in from the seal. It's not due to seal loosing its compression, it is due to the sealent that holds the deal to the boot rim drying out. Then the water can wick over the gap (usually a the top of the boot, and makes its way down to the bottom inside rim, then where the lock is it finds a path to the spare wheel well. I just pulled off seal, cleaned up the ridge around the boot, then cleaned out the actually seal, then redid the rim with silicon and not had a leak in 5 years. (also did same on Mk3). Took no more than two hours. Saved me the cost of a new seal. If you have water gathering on either side (where the air vents are) then that is likely to be rear arch corrosion, which is a bit more of pain to sort out.

From my experience squeaky blades due to build up of film on the screen, could be oil from the road, or rubber lefft from a blade starting to break up. Current blades fitted by garage 3 yearsa ago have been fine up until these last few weeks. I think they were usual standard cheapie replacements. I find cleaning screen with isoproyl alchohol helps for a while. I suspect new blades are better at removing gunk from screen, though should give the blades a good wipe now and again to help. So theres one of my jobs for the weekend.

A common feeling amoungst this wonderful community

The voltage drops you have are withing what might be a typical spec of a car battery, though a battery that is not in best condition. The issue would be what the voltage was under load, such as cranking an engine, and that can only be known with a load test. Is your battery 'rogered', I would say not, could be better. I guess that any sulfation in the battery will degrading ability to actually charge, and hold a charge, but not being a total geek expert, not sure if this is my talking BS. My experience is the battery stops working when you are in the greatest hurry, but both my LS have suffered from alarm triggers caused by battery nearly failing. So when I get a regular run of alarms for no reason each and every day, I will be suspecting my battery is about to go 'properly' west. I always have a spared charged battery in the cellar, which though no use long term in the LS (does not fit so well in the battery tray), gives me the chance to get going, if ever I leave an internal light on by accident. That spare was fine last time and it had been sitting for over 5 months.

Who is the seller on ebay, as there are a few, and i could find the ebay code you posted (or am I doing something wrong). Glad to here your a belt and braces type, that's how it should be.

How long to fit the aerial. Mine needs doing, and was wondering if the pain of just replacing the mast is not worth it and go for a replacement. What was quality of it like, as always worried that some Chinese goods is not well finished.

Years ago a mate of mine tried this pre a holiday to Benidorm (so he did not stand out whern on the beach). He looked like a ruddy carrot, or maybe better to say a Trump. Took two weeks to become his normal pale Brit in colour.

You are right that the headlights look poorer with a full moon. Reason for this is that as you get older your eyes become worse at contrast, so on a dark country lane, you get good contrasts between the dark road, the dark hedge (or ditch) and the headlight beam, but any other light gives your . So keeping headlights clean, and the beam focussed (in other words on Mk4, the acrylic smooth) all helps. The only real option for us oldies is to have eye transplants or get headlights that blind the heck out of on-coming drivers. Other optiion is to get a younger person to chauffer you about. So on this basis we need to make sure the Queens hubbie does not go out at night, coz I expect he could not tell the contrast between an garden wall, and hump-back bridge!!!! Surely he can afford a lacky to drive him about??

Be interested to know what it costs for the rear arch re-fab. I had the same problem, but went the cut out and IsoPon the whole sheebang, though I had enough of the top and sides of arches to get away with. Wax-oiled to the hilt, and will make sure every year gets a good old check over to make sure no more wormholes appearing. Having owned a Mk3, and been in Mk1 the Mk4 is a different motor, and found the gearing makes it a quiter drive at 'legal' speeds.

Delaminating windows is the cloudy issue. New glass (from previous posts) is the answer. Find out how much that costs to sort if it is just one window. I assume over time other glass may start doing the same. If it were me I would be looking at Mk4 LS400, but I know those who own 430 love them, and they are more luxury like in the interior, and having been in one, would vouch for it being a nice car, but not one I would personally hanker after.

Might be worth reading this link. Poly v. Rubber Not a materials engineer myself, though did Mechanical Eng back in 1977 (1st year of degree), and so agree natural materials are better but they wear out before a lot of synthetics. My choice is rubber for damping properties over lifetime of product. Lexus OEM bushes seem to be pretty good rubber given their longevity on the heavy LS.

Sounds like a good price to get them done. Need to get my off-side front done soon as at 193K miles, will get my indy to look at nearside and decide if worth doing both. I guess after 19 years and so many miles this is to be expected, but never had any previous car get to over 160K without really starting to fall apart, let alone be okay to drive at 85mph with the UCA starting to go. Glad to hear that she drives better,

Lovely car, would love one myself, saw one of these when buying my sons first car, was nearly tempted to test drive, but ran out of time. Wifes Jag at 12 years now getting the dreaded Jag sill-rot, shame as rest of the car is great, and handles well, so in 2 MOTs time expect it to be scrapped (which will be a shame) Jag engines are really nice free running beasts, so 400bhp sounds like fun in such a light car.

Martin, Would agree on all points you made, took me a while to find right seat settings to feel as good as when I had Vaux Omega. Would say LS seats could be better, I think back seats are better by a long way, but hard to drive when sitting in back. On heated seats the LS range seems to be a gentle warmer, been in Audi/FOrd/BMW of late where your backside is being roasted within 10 seconds, so agree on really cold morning LS is a little too gentleman like. Mondoe V6 in Ghia, a nice car, not driven one, but previous Ford experience tells me Mondeo a well sorted machine more or less since day 1.. X-type, the wife has one, Sport 2 litre, moves well, cheapish to run, but would say after 10 years expect to be spending a lot of money on welding sills every couple of years. Seems to be really common problem on Jags, not just X-type. Grips road well, but clatters about a fair bit, and not so quite at 80 as I would like. Running gear seems susceptible to earlier replacement than I would expect (well compared to LS). If it were me I would stick with Mondeo and enjoy life with the brilliance of heated windscreen (I know Ford used to have patents on this tech, so maybe thats reason why not a common feature).