NEV72

5,000 miles per year

Came across this spreadsheet I made up, for when I was seeing if LPG would be viable to install on my RX300, obviously you are governed by the amount of mileage per year you do, the more mileage the more viable it becomes, this was worked out on 23,000 miles. Pretty much anybody with a minimal amount of EXCEL spreadsheets can do the same as I have done here, just change the miles per year, petrol cost per litre, LPG cost per litre, to suit. 23,000 miles per year 10,000 miles per year 5,000 miles per year http://i100.photobucket.com/albums/m10/NEV72/lpg5000peryear.jpg

Well aye, I could have taken the diesel Astra and got better economy, but cramped up after that sort of mileage, I would have ended up looking like a Chinese woman's bound up foot.

Well, just returned home tonight after taking the RX400h on a good testing drive, was hoping the weather would be as bad as last couple of weeks, so as to see if the inverter problem returned, but it's been absolutely lovely, with only the odd spitting of rain . Started out on Saturday, from Devon up to Melton Mowbray, then over to Derby, from Derby to Snowdonia, down the west coast of Wales to Brecon, and back home to Devon, a total of 850 miles, much impressed with the 30.7 mpg it averaged out to, having taken on motorways, country lanes and mountainous roads, encountering no problems on the way whatsoever. Certainly a happy chappy.

Aye you could be right, now that the price of LPG per litre has started to shoot up, it's becoming less and less viable to install then make its savings margin in comparison to say 5 years ago, my only regret is that I didn't get on the gravy train and claim a grant, helping towards installation, from the government, that was available just prior to me buying my RX300. But having moved on and now into the realms of Petrol/Electric Hybridivity, I now find myself facing the usual detractors, but this time with the "electric motah, ranning on battereees, yer having a giraffe in't cha? nah, nah nah it'll never work," amateur wanna be Jeremy Clarkeson types, hopefully in 4-5 years time, I'll be able to post how reliable and economical to run the Hybrid has been for me, just as I've been able to regarding the RX300 with LPG has been, and by then also emoticons will have developed a 'smug git' emoticon.

Well I paid a total of £1750, for mine back in 2008, I did see it as low as £1300 in some other places and as high as £2000, and with mine I had the Flashlube drip system fitted, so as to prevent valve problems, as for £2300 for your quote, does seem pretty steep that, no wonder you dipped out. For a car that you intend to keep for 2-3 years plus, and you are financially in a position to be able to afford to install LPG, I would definitely recommend fitting LPG, but if you're one of those people that keeps their car for 5 minutes before wanting to change it, ie you get bored, ashtray full, not up to expectations, etc, etc, then no it's not for you.

No Box I didn't mean the bro in law actually gets 26 mpg from his car due to LPG, I was trying to say that he now gets the financial equivalent to 26mpg due to LPG being half the price of Petrol. As for using petrol to start the car, yes that's true, but for about the same amount of time it takes for your car heater to warm up from cold, when first starting your car up.

You see Arther I'm going to disagree with you over LPG,mainly because from what I can fathom, you haven't had a car that's actually run on LPG, whereas I can say I have. I purposely chose to get LPG fitted before I even bought my old RX300,back in 08,and that was after doing extensive research, and not listening to some bloke spouting it out in a pub somewhere, who'd maybe got a bum ride, because he hadn't done any research,and find out all the different types of systems available, maybe even finding a company that had actually converted the same car as his, so he could seek reviews from other owners. and possibly chosen some cheap backstreet mob, trying to save a couple of hundred quid. To be fair this old LPG chestnut has done the rounds a fair old bit now, in fact only yesterday I came across another previous LPG thread, where I'd put my first post in there just after I'd had LPG fitted that's nearly 5 years ago now, with exactly the same stuff bantered about,the do I, don't I brigade, the it'crap, it's good brigade, well I only recently got rid of mine a couple of weeks ago, and can honestly say it was a damn good thing that I had the LPG put in it, the performance was exactly the same as the petrol engine, regardless of the detracters saying it isn't, a bloody cheap round trip up to John O'Groats, from Devon in it, plus the other 80,000 odd miles we did in it, never, ever did it let me down, but it could be because I'd had it fully serviced each year, the LPG system that is, As for the 18mpg car you say you enjoy, my brother in law has Beckhams old GMC Yukon,a great big 6 litre monster I think it is, when he first bought it, he was getting just 13mpg out of it, he saw how mine was economical, so went for the same system as the onein mine, he still has the monster, and is returning a relevant 26 mpg due to the cost of the LPG compared to petrol. That's my ten bobs worth anyroad.

Very impressive Dan, the chap I take my bikes to, Brian Loram, has a mint gt750, as does his brother, infact his brother has two,but is selling one, certainly a good investment, better than the banks these days, I see that the H2's are fetching daft money even as project bikes, I often wish I still had my 750/4 from back in the day, I had a 77 TR7 with the Sprint engine fitted, but had to sell when a conspicuous lump appeared on the front of my missus, tried to get a baby seat fitted but no joy, so flogged on and bought an RS2000. Nice car the 400h eh? do you have the hot tub option for the back? I reckon mines sprung a leak and could be the cause of my faulty inverter

Any particular type of bikes Dan? I also keep myself busy in the man den, with mainly old XT's and DTR's, Working on a 92 DTR that I've managed to shoehorn a Belgarda 4dl TZR engine into at the minute, all started up just a bit of snagging work to finish.

Live, on my daughters farm............pesky vermin and tasty birds :winky: Sounds like Magaluf, does that

We still talking golf?

Well I know it wasn't the receptionist, as I couldn't hear the squelching of chewing gum as she was telling me, could've been their service manager/ess though.

Straight from the horses mouth that. honest injun

I reckon I'd have your set of golf clubs outa the boot within 10 seconds of you disappearing into your house, after watching it open up, with nobody about doing an 'open sesame' Hyperthetically speaking of course. Shame is thieves also think in the real world

I get where you're coming from there Box, but doesn't help any, as now I'm thinking it may not be the inverter but a sensor shorting out due to water, but no fuse blown? daft

Oh forgot btw, and this may be of benefit to you other lads with the Hybrid, now hark at this one, apparently parking on an incline can affect the gel in the batteries, seems the gel can all move to one end, now if she meant leak I don't know but move towards one end, whats that all about? leave the lead cells exposed?

Well then if that's the case and it's under the bonnet, I'd say that whoever has had the unit open to either upgrade or swap componants, and not resealing it back up are at fault, and that was Lexus Poole, the car therefore being unfit for purpose due to inept workmanship. Surely to god, you can't buy a car and be unable to park it on your driveway, incline or no, and be at blame for any problems that may occur.

No probs there, it'll more than likely be a new 2014 450h, she's well covered, ;-)

No not yet Paul, I did ask them also to check the carpets to see if they were waterlogged, when the mechanic went to go and try to start it, but never said. she did however say that the inverter was under the bonnet, now is this right?

It certainly looks like we're going to have to go for like for like, don't fancy playing Russian Roulette every time it rains.

O.K picture this scenario, you get home, car is all nicely locked up, you're parked on driveway which is roughly 10 feet from front door, you unlock your house front door, car key on fob remember, your cat that has been shut inside all day decides it needs to get out and do it's business shoots out of the house through your legs, but its raining so decides to shelter first under your car you reversed into the driveway so the boot is nearest the house, you are oblivious to the fact that you are now entering the house keys in hand and cat under your boot/bumper, tailgate rises seeing as how you were 10 ft from car with car key but cat is under the car bumper doing what ever cats do, but by this time you are in the house, cat under car nice and dry, but tailgate is up and its peeing rain into you pride and joy.

Main problem also is that missus has a company Astra, so we declined a courtesy car, obviously thinking it would be a couple of days max, I have a 50th birthday do to go to on Saturday, up near Melton Mowbray, so it'll be a mission me squeezed into an Astra,all the way from Devon, plus all my mates are expecting me to turn up in my soooper doooper new Hybrid I've been raving on about, (can you be compensated for loss of face? )and will give me no end of grief, plus wife is changing job soon and is expected to hand back said Astra, to her company.

No the days when you got out of the taxi at an airport, and the taxi driver pushed a button on his dash to open the boot, with which you'd often say "very clever now get off your arse and close it, because my hands are full with luggage", isn't the same as pointing your key at the tailgate and watching it rise up and then close itself, but having to stand by the actual tailgate and 'wiggling' your foot under the bumper, and then instantaneously having to turn around to see if your kid has fallen over and hurt themselves, for an example may result in a nasty bump on yer napper. Now I'm all for gadgets and technology, but sometimes you can over egg the pudding, so to speak.

Well it's now been a week, and the car has been sat in Lexus Exeter, received a phone call from Lexus explaining that neither Lexus Exeter nor Lexus Poole, are admitting any liability for the damaged inverter, and that I am to get in touch with my insurers, I explained that due to the fact that I have to pay an excess of £500, for a kick off, and that's presuming my insurers would pay out for a replacement inverter, I wasn't a happy chappy. I did however suggest to them that they go and actually try and start the car, to see if by any chance the problem had rectified itself, seeing as we haven't had the deluge we had the week before, which had caused the problem in the first place They said they would get a mechanic to go and try this and that they would get back to me, a phone call shortly later and low and behold, the car is starting fine and no 'CHECK HYBRID SYSTEM' error message showing up on the dash. How it took a week, and a customer suggesting this, not a mechanic, I'll never know, anyway, they then go on to ask if I'm happy with this, which I replied I'd need to have a chat with the wife, as she was driving the car when everything just came to a halt, brakes, engine, power steering, and luckily for her it was at 20mph, and not 60-70mph on the bypass/motorway, the consequences of that happening are unthinkable, and also I would need a written guarantee that this would never happen again, the unit would need to be sealed within an inch of it's life, and the leak wherever it is getting in would need sealing up also, providing this was all sorted out, I personally would be ok with this, but like I told them I'd need to speak with the other half, but if I can't be guaranteed this, the car would be going back, and I'd implement the 30 day return clause. I had to go out so was unavailable to take any calls so told the wife to ring them up after a couple of hours, and speak to the salesman who dealt with the sale of the car in the first place, apparently he had no idea of the latest situation, but did advise us that we wouldn't receive a refund, and that basically we would be found another car, same specs, price etc. Which is another thing we weren't aware of, maybe our ignorance in not reading the small print. Now the initial sales service was great, the car itself when we took it out, was absolutely everything you'd expect from it, it seems the aftersales has fallen a little flat on it's face. Now the predicament we are in is this, do we take back the car, on Lexus Exeter's word that it's fixed?and take a gamble on it not happening again, (on brother in laws advice that any electrical circuit board being water damaged, is actually weakened)or do we take another car from them, those are the only two options available, as I said before, there is no refunding.