johnatg

Some tyres are much, much better than others on snow and ice. I remember vividly driving in central Norway in the winter about 12 years ago - I was driving a Opel Astra and was able to do over 100 kph on hard packed snow with Continental winter tyres - and in full control. And I was still overtaken by the occasional truck and coach going even faster. The temperature was -17deg C. And down by the coast (or at least a fjord) I passed a british car - I forget what it was. He was obviously not on winter tyres and was pretty much out of control. Proper winter tyres are amazing!

Avon ZV7 But if you need semi winter tyre performance, Michelin Cross Climates. Not sure if you can get any of these in your size. Sent from my PSP7551DUO using Tapatalk

I think you will find it will protrude - space savers are fitted for a reason...... Your car has Type A wheels/tyres - Lexus recommended tyre size is 205/55R16 89W (see the handbook) There may be insurance issues with using V rated tyres. You could check with your insurance company - some don't mind you fitting lower speed rated tyres, others do. I once asked both my insurance company (I forget which) and the police and neither minded that I planned to fit H rather than recommended V rated tyres (I think it was on a Mazda 626, but it was a long time ago). If you drive in Europe I think you must have correct speed rated tyres (ie W)

Check the battery connections - they can push off a bit as you tighten the clamps. Try very gentle tapping with a light hammer as you tighten them. If that doesn't work check the earth to body (from the battery) where it connects to the body.

Have you changed the oil feed pipe to the turbo? If not, you certainly should - blockage of it is the usual cause of turbos failing, especially failure of a recently fitted one.

Ken is absolutely correct! Here you go: 'TWC' means 'Three Way Catalyst' I don't think £1700 even includes the manifolds/front cats, does it?

Looking at the drawings of the pipes again it occurs to me that the things in the front exhaust assembly which look like cats can't actually be cats - the cats are incorporated into the exhaust manifold assemblies - see here: You'll see that the air fuel ratio sensors are in front of the cats and the heated oxygen sensors (which check on cat performance) are in the front exhaust pipe assembly but in front of the bulges which people posting above (including me) have assumed are cats. So if the 'bulges' aren't cats, what are they? Just expansion chambers?

It might be worth trying to get the crack welded up - should last for quite a while. Otherwise, I think JP would be able to cut the pipe just in front of the resonator, either before or after the Y section, makeup a new resonator and reassemble. It could be made in stainless and sleeved onto the remaining front pipe. As I mentioned above it would be worth getting a brace fitted between the bottom of the resonator at the back end to the front of the flange - that would provide triangulated reinforcement to the pipe where it emerges from the resonator. That shouldn't cost a fortune, especially if there's room to cut the pipe behind the Y section so that they just have straight inlet and outlets to the resonator to deal with, and would be a good long term solution.

Hmm...did you actually see them remove the front engine room cover to adjust the lights? It's a rather tortuous business on the IS.

Or find out where your exhaust is blowing and see if it's repairable. Pop over and see these people http://www.jpexhausts.co.uk/ They provide an excellent service - I've had several bits and pieces of exhausts made up by them over the years. They do both mild steel and stainless.

No experience I'm afraid - my exhaust is still original and my car is 2006. Try this place: http://www.carpartgiant.co.uk/Products/Lexus/Is250/2.5L/Exhaust-Back-Box.aspx (Bottom one on the list of parts)

I'm not so sure - I think you should ask them to confirm that it will fit a 2009 - all the exhaust places quote different part numbers for pre and post 2008. If there are differences they won't be much, but it may mean making up adapters or cutting pieces off and reworking somewhere or other. The tailpipe shape never changed - all the tailpipes from the silencers are round (and quite large diameter) but have what Lexus describe as 'tail exhaust pipe baffle sub-assembly' pushed on to the end - (exhaust trims to most people). Those are polished stainless steel and oval shape - they all look the same to me, although no doubt many have been replaced. They get in a mess, but with a bit of TLC you can restore them to more or less original condition - they are made of good quality (if a bit thin) stainless steel. The originals cost upwards of £50 but you can get universal replacement trims for a tenner or so.

There we are, sir - just like new! Yeah, right.......

Here's a diagram of the IS250 fuel system:

Connect to the vehicle, choose the appropriate model, year etc, then go on to System Select, click on 'engine' then 'Trouble Codes'. You can only find out what does what when it's connected to the car. Check out the 'help' section in the program - it's really quite helpful!

Yes - and also the timebase. I've looked at the Techstream 'Help' section - if you look under 'Diagnostics functions....'/'Graph function (data monitor)' - scroll down to Menu - Time setup, it shows you how to adjust the horizontal axis to show the data over different time periods. And a whole lot of other settings as well. Not tried it live, just on my desktop so far. Must really spend some time with Techstream - it obviously can do way more than I thought - or at least have tried so far!

The first problem you need to solve is the misfiring - I assume those codes are still returning if you clear them? If you manage to restore, or replace, the cats they will just be poisoned again by the unburnt fuel from the misfire. I don't think there's a code as such for failed cat - you'll just get a code for lambda being out of range. Odd that you don't seem to have that but Techstream will show the lambda readings from the downstream oxygen sensors. Get hold of Techstream - that will show which cylinders are misfiring and to what extent - see this pic: That screen shows no misfires, but during the half hour or so that I was running the engine to take that and other shots, one or two misfires did show up later. It is also a little concerning that you are smelling rotten eggs inside the car. It is true that you can smell Hydrogen Sulfide in very small concentrations (it is detectable at less than 1 part per billion) but it does imply that exhaust gas is getting into the car. Check for any leaks - eg trunk seals and try differnt heater settings (fresh air/ recirculate, fan speeds). Keep the windows shut. Try using different fuel - some gas contains more sulfur than others - the Bakken deposits are rumoured to have particularly high levels of sulfur - maybe your gas is coming from there? But that would be affecting everyone and there's no evidence of that. Hydrogen Sulfide is extremely dangerous - you should not drive long distances if you can smell it strongly. And one of its effects is to deaden your sense of smell, so you smell it less as time goes by.

They do - but mention numerous other factors too. Now I have virtually zero knowledge of, and am certainly no fan of, modern diesels - I did run a Citroen BX19 diesel estate back in the mid 80s - that was a brilliant car for its time, but as it was a company lease I never got to grips with the mechanics. So anything I say here is pure hearsay from the article and I only raised the topic because of the frequent er..discussions about the subject here. The technical adviser for the article was the founder of DPF-Doctor, an organisation which is apparently establishing a nationwide chain of garages equipped to deal with the problems. They advise that frequent causes are people ignoring apparently minor warnings and malfunctions - general maintenance, really. But anyone with, or anticipating problems really should buy the mag (£4 for one off) and read the whole thing for yourselves! The front cover is emblazoned 'Troubleshooting Diesel Particle Filters'!

They're very much on their last legs - collection in store only (and they're not taking cash - card payment only)

Another quick heads up! If you need a leather cleaner/protection kit - as you may know, Multiyork (furniture retailer) are in administration and their stores are having a sell off. I bought a leather care kit (250ml cleaner and 250ml Protection cream) for £3 - reduced from £18. It may or may not be the best on the market, but for £3 who's complaining? You probably only have days left to snap up a bargain!

Just a quick heads up for those of you with diesels - Car Mechanics magazine this month (February 2018 issue) has an interesting article about DPFs - how they work, what goes wrong and how they can be cleaned etc. It also mentions EGRs etc (and Catalytic Converters for petrol engines) but the main focus is on DPFs

Yes - I'm sure the wideband sensors run at about 3.3V with a stoichometric mixture. The older type downstream sensors vary between about 0.1 and 0.9 volts but Techstream just reports lambda, which we discussed somewhere above. To get the graphs you click on whichever parameters you want on the top 3 screens above. The particular row is then highlighted blue. Then you click on the graph icon at the bottom of those screens. You get the parameters shown as stacked graphs (4th pic down). You can then choose to show any one of them full screen - there are menu, full screen and graph type buttons on each graph. I guess there's a way of setting the timebase but I haven't explored that.

In the interests of science, I've been out and played with my Techstream a bit - and surprised myself. Here are a few snaps of live engine data, concentrating on the oxygen sensors (upstream and downstream). The engine was cold when I started (see it says 5 deg C somewhere) and warmed up whilst I was taking the pics and working out what I wanted to show. Don't worry James - by the time you've got the Techstream connected and worked out what's what with the program the engine will be nicely warmed up if you connect the Techstream as soon as you get in the car and start the engine! Note that the upstream sensors read about 3.3v and the downstream ones show lambda about 1.000. Pay no attention to the numbers - I just chose the pics at random from the ones I took, then cropped and resized them. The numbers are just to differentiate them as I saved them.

To an extent yes - It's a while since I've hooked up my Techstream - I think it's quite hard to get the actual voltages read because it kind of lags what the engine is doing dynamically. The Workshop manual never seems to refer to using Techstream - they do everything with the Intelligent Tester. But Lexus and Toyota dealers do use Techstream but I think only for setting equipment options and things like that. It's handy to drive with Techstream connected up, but for heaven's sake get someone else to read what the computer screen is saying whilst you're driving!

The 'tester' referred to in the manual page is not Techstream - it's a hand held hardware device - known as an 'Intelligent Tester', which Lexus dealers have. You can buy them but they cost about £300 AIR. You can't do any of this testing with Techstream, but it does give you live engine data on fuel trims etc.