simranjit Jhita

Not sure this is still available? 

On 9/4/2022 at 3:19 AM, Tee643 said:

Thanks

So 1650 was with heat exchanger or that was separate.

Cheers

that was the total job price including parts and labour

I've stuck the new Michelin Pilot Sport 5. They are very grippy and arguable the best looking tyres! 275/35/R19 for the rears

On 8/15/2022 at 7:41 PM, Womble72 said:

Where did u end up taking it?

 

Got it sorted from lexus tunbridge wells in the end. 

On 8/4/2022 at 9:09 AM, BTCC_ Racer said:

Nice one, did they change the manifolds? The tick is usually down to them. I had driverside manifold welded up. No more ticking noise. Alot of ISF out there have the famous tick! Absolute pig of a job to remove manifolds.

Did the clean and reseal the valley plate?

No they refused to do it in the same price, they claimed they had to go from bottom up to get the the manifolds. I will likely go aftermarket to get it sorted, getting tired from lexus's excuses. 

They replaced the heat exchager unit and cleaned it all up before resealing it. so in theory it should be good for another 100k or so.

Ahh yes this again, so if you see my thread about this matter it seems very similar. 

things to note that it could be:

1- Radiator leak

2-Water pump malfunction

3-Valley plate sealant issue.

I'm leaning towards the Valley plate issue as it looks almost identical to mine. To give you an idea mine cost £1650 to get repaired by Lexus Tunbridge wells, took 2 days, but the parts took about 6 weeks to get. It generally affects the Americans rather than us due to their harsher climate but alas we aren't exempt from it now. It is definitely not known to the UK lexus garages as mine hadn't even heard about it before mine. They have to tear the engine from top down to get to the affected area, in the end i had my heat exchanger changed too.

Hope this helps.

So got this done finally....my bank account ££££'s lighter but i have a fully functioning car again. I have noticed that the cold start ticking noise has reduced slightly in noise level. Only time will tell if it definitely has fixed the problem but it all seems good so far.

I fear i will not be the only one that suffers from this problem in the UK. I strongly urge you all to keep an eye on coolant. 

3 hours ago, Womble72 said:

Ring up Westfield motors in Rayleigh, essex, Ian or Chris (owners) Andre (one of their employees has an F) they’ve always looked after mine and there’s at least another two ISF’s they look after, only use genuine Lexus parts BUT they’re half the labour cost of Lexus and twice as good 

Brilliant, thanks for this i will give them a call and see what they can offer me. I think it's a relatively easy fix but just a pain to get to the area! Lexus want to replace the whole heat transfer unit etc.. which is concerning for me as it leads me to believe either it's damaged and they haven't told me or they just taking the easy route out by replacing it rather than cleaning it up.

15 hours ago, 4969_LXS said:

That's a bit concerning they didn't know what the valley plate/heat exchanger was. Hopefully they know to be very, very careful with doing the job as it's not uncommon for direct injector connections and knock sensor's to get broken. They get brittle with age and heat cycling. They're not cheap either 😕

 

Me too hope they don't break anything further, but so far everything seems all good. I'm a bit shocked they hadn't heard of a valley plate too, lets hope it doesn't affect anyone else in the UK, but I fear I not the only one. 

5 hours ago, F4Fun said:

Got to be one of the first valley plates here in the UK?

This is my thinking, they didn't even know what a valley plate was until after they did research etc... i'm just overall disappointed with Lexus, it's an expensive issue to rectify. I'm going to ask around to see if i can get the job done for cheaper

I honestly cant remember which version they were, it was about 7/8 years ago, i just remember being so disappointed with constant wobble.....so much so i spoke to good year directly, apparently was a known issue on other vehicles but not for the lexus.

I've kept the same profile size as OEM but i'm running 255 for the fronts and 275 for the rears....no problems

As the Goodyear eagle F1 tyres....i've tried them and they cause a significant swaying when driving on motorways....not sure why but i couldn't wait to replace them back for the Michelin Pilot Sport 4S

This looks interesting, i'd be up for this meet....my F is still currently 'under construction' but i'll meet up none the less

UPDATE:

So Lexus have diagnosed the problem as the valley plate leak. They want to replace the heat transfer unit and the sealant however the sealant is out of stock.....surprise surprise! So they put my car back together and told me to wait till it comes in stock....been like a month now and haven't heard anything from them.....i've emailed Lexus UK and basically got told to just wait and they won't get involved.

On 5/22/2022 at 12:47 AM, ubersonic said:

A lot of American owners, the valley plate issue is related to issues with the north American climate and the sealant Toyota use on the 2UR-GSE valley plate, which were obviously never identified during the cars development in Japan, it's not really something you have to worry about in Europe (or at least the UK) unless you're super unlucky.

 

If I've read the thread right you say you originally say the radiator leaking after getting a new water pump fitted and they replaced the radiator for free because they damaged it changing your water pump, but after this you still had a leak just not from the radiator and this has been going on for years now.  Is it possible that the new water pump was never sealed properly and has been leaking slightly ever since? If they damaged the radiator when reinstalling it then a leak from the pump would probably have been masked by the leaking rad when they replaced the rad.

Ahh i hope so, banking on it being a relatively simple solution as the water pump seal rather than valley plate issue, either way i'm very disappointed with Lexus Tunbridge Wells as they have effectively been selling it as a simple air lock, and consuming coolant over time is normal behaviour. I've booked it in for them to look at next week.

6 hours ago, BTCC_ Racer said:

Fairplay - keep us updated, im fairly new to the ownership of a ISF. First thing i did was got the manifolds welded and changed the Rad.

I will definitely keep you updated. Seems to be a fairly common problem in the states.

Also welding the manifolds was a good shout, where did you get this done and how much did it set you back if you don't mind my asking?

3 minutes ago, BTCC_ Racer said:

I doubt its the manifold which will cause a leak.

Could be that the coolant as just aged and started rotting the new pipes of the rad? Get them to source the leak if its a rad get it changed asap i wouldnt drive the car to be on the safe side.

Haha bit late for that I’ve been driving it for about 4 years with this problem 😂 Lexus kept telling me it’s an air lock due to the new radiator fitted. I’ve contacted them and they will investigate. I’m inclined to think it’s a valley plate issue. 

1 hour ago, BTCC_ Racer said:

Looks like you need radiator. Was this ever changed in the cars life?

Yeh got a new radiator years ago when they replaced my water pump. 

5 hours ago, Charliecloud said:

Every week is not right, where are you having it serviced ? They should have picked that leak up. Check under your engine cover to see if you can see that pink liquid stain on the valley between the heads.

I get it serviced at Tunbridge Wells. And for years I’ve been telling them yet they said nothing is wrong, that it’s normal etc… only at the weekend I finally saw underneath the car to notice the leak. 
 

I’ve read a lot about valley plate on the American forums. Seems like it affects a lot of owners. Also I heard about it could be a cracked manifold?! I hope not! 

7 hours ago, Arqum said:

Hey man, long time no speak. Get your Rad changed ASAP………. It’s a known weakness and to prevent anything worse happening get it done.

it could be the valley plate leak but you will see coolant near the head up top.

I suspect the rad is leaking from the join on the underside.

Hey man yeh long time indeed!

I got the rad changed the first time I saw it was leaking down the radiator etc.. they did that FOC as they damaged it when replacing the water pump!

this time I’m getting it leaking underneath and nothing from top is visible! 

Hi, not sure of this has been covered or asked before but i seem to be topping up my coolant frequently every week. Only reason I noticed the problem was when my car wouldn't provide heating when car idling, this is going back 5/6 years ago now after i had all the recall work done. I keep telling the garage that i have this problem but they say it's normal to lose a little coolant and it could be an air lock.

Well i was getting exhaust work done and i noticed coolant on the underside of my car....i'm now convinced there is a leak and surely Lexus surely should have picked this up on a service/vehicle check as they definitely look under the car to inspect! I've sent them an email now and see what they say but i'm unsure if anyone else has had this problem?

I have attached photos i took while the car was up in the air.

To update I have nothing much to report....

Sent them my complaint, had a reply 2 days later saying they will look into it. That is now almost 2 weeks ago and nothing at all.

Oh they did ring me last week to say my recall parts were in, told them to return them to wherever they got them from as I won't return. Would have said more but I was busy.

It's truely crazy, I've seen the decline over the years, unfortunately not the same as they once were!

yeh definitely will voice my experience with them if they call, not much can be done though now.

Exactly, or at least phone me prior to say they haven't got the parts in etc..

oh forgot to mention they also left a letter on my seat, opened it and it was a letter regarding trading in my IS 300H F sport for a new car as they would give me a good price etc... that made me laugh! Absolute joke! <_<

I don't usually complain much but the experience i had with Lexus Birmingham was an absolute joke.

Booked my IS-F for service about a month ago and at same time thought I would get the recalls done at same time, all booked and confirmed with courtesy car. While there, thought i may aswell try out the RC-F so i booked in a test drive at same time.

So handed the key over to Lexus. They then booked me in their courtesy car.....the silly CT200h, i asked for something else and they responded with 'thats all we have'. I thought ok not a huge biggie i'm not a fan of the CT200h but so long as i have access to a car. Then i enquired about the test drive i arranged, they looked at me blank faced saying 'we don't have one with us, it's currently up north', but they would try to get it for when i come to collect my car after the work gets done (2 days later). Obviously disappointed as i had arranged this about a month ago but thought ok so long as it's there in 2 days time.

Ok next day had a phone call from Lexus Birmingham (i thought ok that was extremely fast if they have done the work), the guy said they hadn't received the part for the recall and hence couldn't get it done, at this point i was in shock. I had taken time off work to get all this sorted and given them about a month to sort themselves out.

Went to collect my car and obviously i voiced my disappointment and frustration, they offered to call me when parts had come in but because i live such a distance from Birmingham i told them they could keep the parts and i probably won't return. (I was attending a conference in Birmingham and thought i'd sort out car while there).

To make matters worse i had a phone call as i was driving back from Lexus Birmingham after collecting my car to arrange a test drive for the RC-F! Haha i told her i had already arranged it for this weekend as i was visiting and had no plans to return any time soon. Thing is i actually really liked the RC-F, if i had driven it i may have been very tempted to purchase, so they may have missed out on a sale.

I've dealt with Lexus Birmingham before and they have been generally satisfactory but this experience was so bad it was hilarious! Suffice to say i won't be returning to Birmingham Lexus!

So rant over! Haha what a hilarious experience now that i look back at it.