Cotswold Pete

If you have not driven an LS previously, best to test drive one or two to get a feel. £2.5K seems a good budget, and check for last cambelt change. Even high mileage should sound nice a quite once fired up, and then find some speed humps to drive over listening for any knocking to check control arm wear on the front. Check for rust in rear arches (prod with small screwdriver), and water in the boot (easy one to solve), and check all electrics and dashboard lights (which is a pain if you need to start taking dashboard out). There are enough good examples out there, so do not jump at the first one you try, unless it really feels and sounds right. When I bought my Mk4, having pranged my Mk3, I did buy the first one I tried, but I spent over 3 months on ebay/autotrader scouting around, before heading off to have a look. It just felt right and I took it for test drive on my own, found a layby and gave it a good prodding (so to speak) before saying yes. The only thing I did not do was really poke around in the wheel arches, and five years later discovered the extent of a festering problem (now solved and watertight). Best of luck in your search

Already had deposit taken, but it looks like a bargain, and agree the other one is not worth £12K more. I would have been up to Smethwick like a shot if I really needed another 400, I love the bronze colour

If I won the lottery, and having drunk a bottle of whisky to celebrate, suddenly felt the need to blow £15K, he might be in with a chance, otherwise I would have said £4K at most. Not sure why he did not modify the doors, so the brollies would fit in them as they do in a Roller.

Sounds like a lot of hard work, but sure will stand out, as polished alloy wheels can look as near as damn it, like chromed. I prefer the understated matt finish you get with the LS. Not sure if using a Laser Stripper would be a nice quick way of getting it done, if you could find somewhere nearby. Whatever you do, be good to see end result when done

Is there some poor person with a 2CV wondering why they have a rather large windscreen that just will not fit?

£380 for genuine Lexus parts fitted strikes me a a good bargain, as disks are about £140 to £160 a pair, and the pads I recall around £90, then I assume they are sorting out the pad wear indicators, for that price. I would say there are enough LS owners who have had issues with non-Lexus braking systems, where you get rattle, knocking, vibration (at varying speeds). I changed to Pagid from BluePrint pads, and they rumble less than the Blueprints, but I suspect my LS does not have original disks on, so aiming to replace with all Lexus parts sometime soon, when I can get by backside in gear and off to the garage. As to the aeriel have a look at Repairing Antenna and Lexus Antenna the antenna is not original Lexus parts, so if you're not sure then I would probably go for £80 and get a proper Lexus whole aerial replacement, as £80 better than paying £50 for Lexus Antenna and then spending a couple of hour b*ggering about. I would say that the non-Lexus all-in replacements you see on ebay Cheap replacement are probably okay for a couple of years, but whether they will be quite as smooth and quite as the genuine unit, I would not know.

Crikey, you do not hang about when it comes to getting cars sorted. I really like the Smokey Granite, a bit more understated than the Blue. Best of luck with this one.

Those long service intervals are not a problem in terms of any real damage to the engine. I once ran for 25K between service interval on my Mk3, and noticed nothing other than the engine oil was a rather discoloured, but not as sludgy as you might get from a lesser engine. Not so sure I would allow my LS to have two 25K service intervals though! However if your gut feel is 'not sure', then you might end up always wondering if something is about to go wrong every time you start the car up. Seems to be a few 2008 models out around your £7K-£8K requirement, just depends how far you want to travel.

Are you saying that if you manually lock the passenger front door, it does not lock the other doors, if that is the case, I would be punting a guess that it is the door ecu, or maybe a fuse has gone. I assume you have no problems starting the car, which implies that the keys are reset to the main ECU.

I have often pondered that question, given my 400 turns better than my sons 206. As to every day use, been using this and previous LS every day for last 10 years, no other way to drive to work. Sure it uses a bit more petrol than your average car, but what a way to waft to work

Why not use lexusofficialstore seller on ebay, I know that it will be a lot more, but I think with brakes etc, always best to get OEM rather than try and save few quid. The LS seems to be a real problem with vibration when not using OEM pads/discs. I recently changed to Pagid pads (got fed up with blueprints - too much vibration about 4 months after fitting), but even the Pagids vibrate and squeak. I suspect my discs are not OEM (not fitted by me), so time to dig a bit deeper and get it done right, and then sit back and not worry about the brakes for a long time.

A crying shame, must make you want to spit nails (much like you did in posting) When I pranged my previous LS, I was so furious that I managed to find the strength to hand pull the front wing off the front tyre to get me home. It was the next day my back started giving me gip. Those panels are pretty solid. My only good luck was I pranged the week before was about to spend a lot of money. best of luck with search for the replacement.

Not so sure they are that bad, but I often think mechanics think customers are just drivers of cars, so they should not be asking questions about plugs, or any of that other complicated stuff under the bonnet. Thats the great thing about this forum, plenty of people who know there stuff, but I have known many a mechanic poo-poo forums (on what basis I am not sure) C'est la vie🙁

Andy, I asked my mechanic the other week and his reply was, 'If it is not misfiring no need to change the plugs'. Not so sure that this is the best advice I have had, and he said that the plugs were expensive - I think what he meant was compared to your average £3 plugs, the LS is not so cheap Also given the throttle body gets gunked up, that is indicator of how dirty fuel is, and so the plugs after 50/60K miles are not going to be in tip top condition. I remember when I used to take the plugs out for a good clean every 10K miles in the olden days, and was amazed at how a good clean pepped up the old banger I had then. Be interested to here what your mechanic says.

Not a bad looking affair, but it looks a little pregnant compared to the lines of any of the recent LS, GS range. Still it is a Toyota, so most likely a nice car to own and drive. Interesting to see how it evolved since the 50's from this - Crown Mk1

My only thought is possible issues with fuel line/fuel pump, as you have already had throttle body cleaned, which is typical of the symptoms you describe. Other things I can think of is are you getting poorer MPG, might be the oxygen sensor. Other sensor issues I have had in past (not on LS) is the crank sensor playing up, making for random starting issues.

Its got to be a Piaggio for those kind of streets. Maybe put the Piaggio in the boot of LS (just in case needed)

Such a shame that Lexus are letting themselves down like this

The LS has a supremely balanced engine, so makes sense it would put less strain on the belt. In reference to the ECU problem, it would be worht getting the ECU looked at, as my experience with previous Mk3 was it just got worse and worse to the point where the cut-out was becoming darned dangerous, and more or less every trip was becoming stressful. If the capacitors are leaking then they will slowly create more damage on the ECU board if not careful.

Fading in and out was half the fun, I also used to listen to Radio Caroline. 'Radio caroline the pirate years: Oakwood Press', is well worth a read to bring back all that nostalgia. I think Ride A White Swan by T. Rex is my first memory of pirate radio.

Interesting comment on the Mk3 cutout problem going now timing is aligned correctly. My old garage said pulleys did not need replacing at last cambelt change on my Mk4, which was over 50K ago, and at last MOT they said it was about time to think about a new belt, but it looks pretty fine to me, but not so sure I'll risk 100K life. Still as you said great result and sounds like you have a car running as smooth as a baby's bottom. Excellent.

Totally agree, I have to listen to his naff show every day as the office insists on playing it. This is odd as most staff are way younger than me, yet they refuse to listen to Radio 6 (or even Radio 1 extra - which would be preferable to radio 2). However I do listen radio 2 in the evening if I get bored with Tom Ravenscroft or Annie Mac. What is really interesting is that my teenage kids do not ever listen to radio, so I wonder what the airwaves will be like in 20 years time when I am probably going to be shuffling off this planet (assuming I get to be 80 years young).

I am not aware that the radio has a default setting. My only thought is whether you have some conflict with the AF, TA, PTY settings. It might be that where you are Classic FM is really strong, so with the above settings out of kilter, the radio will just seek out the strongest signal regardless, or you have PTY set to 'CLASSIC', and it just goes for Classic FM. I will admit there are times when I get confused by the combination of options, so not sure if fiddling around with those settings will get you back to radio 2 bliss.

I would get your doctor to check you over. My missus was rear ended at 5mph, (on M4 years ago). She was fine for first 3 or 4 days, then the pain back and neck pain really took hold. Was about 6 or so visits to physio that got it sorted (and covered by other drivers insurance). Hopefully car has nothing major underneath to sort out. The only time I have ever been rear-ended was by a bloke on a motorbike, thankfully he was fine, and all there was on the bumper was an imprint of tyre rubber.

There are loops under the car near both rear silencers, put the hooks in the loops (just be careful not to have anything touching the exhaust. One thing take care with is side cord hooks, then can run against the bodywork, so I use a bit of insulating tape on the boot body panels. I meant to take a photo of when mine is fitted, but have not been out with bikes for a while.