Wass

Yes, I do but don't know/ cant be bothered to faff about finding out how to post them on this site. I would suggest you go on fuelly website and look at 2011 CT200s . There's one called Lilya's. The picture shown there shows the blind in position on our car.

I used a piece of 2mm thick white plastic sheeting cut to the size of the lower grille aperture. I hold the blind on with white tie wraps. I splashed out on a Lexus insignia from a shop at the seaside just to make the piece of sheeting look like it belongs where it is. My car is white and the sheeting matches it well enough to get away with it.

You can ask Dan, but I don't remember, I don't have the type of memory which has room for such information. I remember what I owe and what I am owed but once a bill is paid, it is forgotten. I don't even remember how much I paid for the car, suffice to say it isn't nicked:) :D

It does make a small difference. Since this modification doesn't cost me anything to accomplish apart form a few minutes of time spent, its an easy option. Would I sooner my fuel consumption wasn't as affected by the cooler weather or not ? It makes about the same difference as always keeping the tyres at the upper limit of their pressure range rather than not bothering to check them at all.( I noticed on a previous vehicle that tyre pressures really do vary with ambient temperature in keeping with school boy gas law physics universal gas law P/T= constant provided that volume is constant. In other words, if the temperature goes down the pressure in the tyre will drop too; if the temperature goes up. the pressure in the tyre increases.) Improving a few MPG for very little effort or expenditure is a worthwhile exercise. I expect to cover about 8000 miles this winter so saving 5% or thereabouts on my fuel costs means I travel 400 miles of those 8000 for free.

Terrific Gerry. I find cruise control to be a very useful tool too. Cant help wondering whether retro fitting it is cheaper than ordering a car with it already fitted. I reckon it is because I don't have to put up with paying for gizmos I don't want but which come with those models fitted with cruise control as standard. Pity Lexus didn't market a version with cloth seats, cruise control, a space saver tyre and doors which stay locked when I walk past the car. Too much to hope for ha ha! :)

Maybe I was looking at the rain sensor which is situated in front of the rear view mirror .. I had assumed that the same device also sensed the light level.

I think the light sensor is positioned near to the rear view mirror. I guess that bird droppings or a stray leaf stuck to the windscreen could be causing the trouble.

I went through last winter with 16" 205/55 s "summer" tyres no trouble at all. I was thinking about getting a set of steel wheels and winter tyres until I realised the cost would be high and the payback on resale almost zero, offset that with the fact that most of the damage ever caused to any of our cars has been the fault of others running into them, and I decided that it would be more economical to see if iphones bounce. :)

ICE internal combustion engine. Our Gen 2 prius has the top grille blocked in the winter while our CT along with the gen 3 has the bottom grille blocked in the winter since its the engine radiator which I wish to blind rather than the inverter and transaxle radiator.

Mine runs with air con switched on the whole time. Keep the car in "normal" and try and keep the gauge out of power as much as you can, lift off and coast to a standstill as much as you can before applying the brakes harder - it's amazing how far you can go without upsetting other road users. If you keep the instant fuel consumption on the display, it's surprising how much difference a lighter touch on the throttle makes, as does cruising at 70 rather than 80. More than any other car I have had the more effort you put in the much higher the returns. I used to have a Deisel Astra which did 47 mpg in normal driving and if I drove it like an absolute saint did not go above 52mpg. Many talk about their CT200h doing height 60's, but usually rush hour driving and needing to be somewhere in a reasonable hurry keeps me from joining them, but 'Wass' has set down the gauntlet to see if I can get over 70! I didnt mean to set down the gauntlet. Our best was set in ideal circumstances which I recognised as such. The heavy lorries in front of me took all the anger out of the " following a blinking hybrid" scenario, we had plenty of time all week, traffic was relatively light in that we caught the magic hour before the school run started and yet the early morning commuters had long gone with the lorries timing their journeys to coincide with their clients factoriy goods received depts opening...between 7.00 and 8.00 in the morning.. Despite managing 71.5 once, I have never been able to best it or even equal it. I think that the closest I came was a 70.and a couple of 69s I wouldnt have thought that it would be possible to get close in the current lower ambient temperatures.

We have owned our CT for more than 2 years@ 12,000 miles a year. Our best is 71.5 mpg tank full to tank full with 74mpg showing on the computer in the car , warm weather, no ac, single carriageway A roads following heavy lorries doing 40 mph.. Our worst was 43mpg tank full to tank full with 45 mpg on the computer in cold wet weather with a lot of motorway work intermixed with lots of braking and accelerating with a relatively new engine ( less than 5000). Like most machines, it does what it is asked to do. In every case I can see good reasons for both high and low comsumptiion figures. I wouldnt pay too much attention to consumption figures until the car has covered 5 to 7 thousand miles since the modern lubricant the Lexus uses seems to make running in period a lot longer than one would expect from vehicles of yesteyear

Glad you were able to get it sorted out Michael. Both myself and Lookers staff were surprised to find that the total amount of parts required for the retro fit were so few. The job was also a lot more simple than they anticipated too. It makes me wonder how many other systems may be present as standard in the base models but simply missing a switch.

Lexus seem to be confused as to what their models come with as standard since the cars supplied quite often vary with the sales brochures.

As a general rule, The diesel is better for motorway or duel carriageway work and the hybrid is better for the single carriageway journeys.I have been fortunate enough to be able to drive the single carriageway and motorway routes with a petrol auto, a hybrid and a diesel auto which is how I decided upon that general rule. I guess that everyone has different standards and so, as someone has already suggested, try one out and see what you think. I currently use my car for a 36 mile each way commute on single carriageway roads (normally following lorries which are impossible to overtake) and so the hybrid is the one to have. I was previously travelling 50 miles each way on motorways or dual carriageways and so the diesel auto was the one to have. I like autos just because the roads are too crowded to really enjoy using a manual.

It appears to me that the specifications of the entire CT range is constantly variable. There seems to be quite a range of off the shelf extras such as electrically heated seats, heated mirrors, folding mirrors, parking aids, driving aids, trims lights, etc. I drew the conclusion that they just fit the car which whatever is in the parts bins during their assembly. The brochures just seem to be an approximation as to what you might expect to be delivered. Perhaps I did well to buy an ex demo since I could actually see what I was getting or so I thought. When I viewed my car at the dealers it had GB euro style number plates. My wife pointed out some months later that the car no longer has those number plates... I simply hadn't noticed. I referred back to the pictures I snapped of it at the dealers and sure enough she was right.... the specification of my ex demo changed a little from what I thought I was buying.

I would agree with Ian. The dealers seem to vary widely.Lexus Hatfield are very good whereas I could not say the same of Lexus Cambridge.

Sawa-di-clap! Your car looks excellent Ben. Superb paintwork! (mine is the same). Some very nice custom touches.

An e mail to Antony Wilson at Lookers in Hatfield will answer your question, You might even be able to get his advice on the correct part numbers required for the job too. I don't have the paperwork. Theres also an article on the American CT200 forum which mentions some prices in America and gives some part numbers too.

My CT base model arrived with no cruise control, heated seats, mirrors etc as one might expect from the base model. Having covered 25,000 miles, something I missed on the longer journeys and also on those long drags through miles and miles of speed camera'd areas was cruise control. I recently discovered that on many CTs which weren't fitted with cruise control, most of the necessary equipment was already fitted to the car and all which was really missing was the cruise control operating switch assembly. A quick chat with Antony Wilson at Lookers at Lexus Hatfield had the necessary parts on order ready to be fitted when the car would be car booked in for a service. ( since I bought the car at 5,000 miles and immediately had it serviced, my service intervals occur 5000 miles too early and so at 25000 miles , the 30,000 mile service was due). The car arrived back with me today with an operational cruise control. Lookers staff confirm that the cruise control operates exactly as they would expect. I am extremely pleased with the outcome. I would recommend anyone who is interested to contact AntonyWilson@lookers.co.uk and I am sure that he will be happy to advise the cost of parts and labour to carry out the upgrade.

I think that I would like a new McLaren P1 more but it really isn't in the same class as a CT200 is it?

I have been driving our car on the 16" options which were available when we bought it. Neither my wife or I have ever had any issues with an uncomfortable ride quality and neither of us has sustained any wheel damage in 25,000 miles. Our tyres are also 205 wide and I suspect that the narrower profile provides a little more grip when the road surface isn't dry. I had heard that a lot of rally drivers use quite narrow tyres on wet or slippery surfaces for a similar reason . I would conclude that the 15" option would provide a much softer ride and slightly less responsive feel to the steering whilst the higher profile will also reduce risk of kerb damage to both tyre and rim as you suggest. As an ex Volvo 740 ( ugly from the outside but very smooth and comfortable from the inside) driver, my personal preference is to drive a car to suit myself and I am simply not worried how it looks from the outside looking in.(if the onlookers don't like the look of the higher profile tyres perhaps they might like to contribute to the cost of the low profile items? ha ha). I rarely admire my car from the outside at the sort of distance that low profile tyres look aesthetically good.

Useful info Chas, Thanks

Hybrids are generally suited to the things which diesels aren't and vice versa. A diesel will sit quite happily all day long at 70 mph on the motorway and you will get very good fuel consumption from your long motorway journey. The typical hybrid will have very little opportunity to run on its electric motor and so will be unable to recycle hardly any of the energy gained on the throttle over-run or light braking. Therefore your 46mpg represents the fuel consumption of your petrol engine with very little of the hybrid system input. In town driving, however, the diesel fuel consumption will rise dramatically whilst all of the hybrids electronics will be happily running you car on harvested electrical charge from the last braking phase or downhill coasting and the electronics will bring the engine online just for short burst acceleration or battery augmentation. Hence, around town the hybrid fuel consumption improves on your motorway figures whilst your diesel seems to use fuel like there's a hole in the tank. The hybrid performance comes into play very low down the rev range and therefore at very low speeds such as pulling away from traffic lights or away from junctions.. The diesel has a lot of torque but it is mostly towards the lower middle of the rev range and therefore gives the diesel engine car a lot more punch at motorway speeds. My fuel consumption always drops away on fast A roads and motorways. I could easily outperform my 11 plate 1.8 Lexus CT with my 1999 T plated Volvo S80 2.5 litre diesel on both power and fuel consumption on the motorways. However, the old Volvo would be left standing at the traffic lights by the CT. The CT would be gone in an instance whilst the S80 would still be mulling it over as to whether to spin up its turbo-charger.

Hi Wass - it's only the 'Advance' version that comes with TomTom that the screen is solely dedicated to Sat Nav - any other version with screen is like the Prius. :) Thanks for the heads up Paul