Rob-Halifax

Unless you're in the US, that's a long way to sort issues over, anything wrong with it and you have a serious hedache. Might be worth spending the little extra and getting a custome meade on here in the UK. Just my opinion

Lol Rick, I love the way you make use of those very technical terms (naff all) Is there any how to's out there for getting to the starter and removing it? I know it's a bitch to get to on the LS400, i'm hoping I'll have better look with the gs. Cheers

Been away for a few weeks in the sun, came back to lovely cold UK and my GS won't start, it just goes click. The battery is fully charged and I've tried it in Neutral and Park. Before I went away, it had occasionally been doing the same, the odd time it would just click, remove the key and try again, started fine. Now, just a click. Before I go ahead and (try to) change the starter motor from the donor car, I've heard tell of an inhibitor switch, basically, the car still thinks it's in gear. Surely, if that was the case, it would not click at all, it's my understanding that the inhibitor switch will stop the ignition from working if it's not in park or neutral? Anyone suggest the next course of action, i'm not looking foreword to trying to change out the starter if it can be avoided. Cheers Rob

Dude When a member tries to help out (even if you think the advice being given is wrong in your opinion), show some respect and at least have the dignity to reflect that in any comment you make. Idiot!

Sorted now. Just switched both callipers from my donor car, all is well now, no wabbles again.

Chris, you mention sticky caliper strikes again? Is it a common fault, is there any chance it could be the slide pins and not the callipers at all? any chance that they could stick when warm? And! Yep, got a full refund on the MOT, he claimed that there were tolerance notices issued by the ministry that he had not had access to, the ball joints being within those tolerances, should not have failed. I reported him to the ministry anyway, I feel that he was trying to rip me on the price of the repair and failed the car just to aid in his scam. What a git.

Know what it is now. The caliper, when it gets hot it's sticking on, jack the car up when the breaks are cold and all is well, the wheels turn freely, jack it up after the breaks are warmed up and the drivers side wheel cannot be turned by hand, the passenger side wheel can. Net result, the caliper either needs replacing or reconditioning. Least I know what it is now.

Yet more issues. Hi guys, just had my car MOT'd, it failed on the bottom ball joints and the guy wanted to charge me £350 to supply and fit some new one's he passed it on everything else. Well, I thought he was dodgy (Ball joints? £350? lol) so I bought some off a guy on ebay for £70 + shipping and started to fit em, all the nuts were not coming off no matter what I tried so I booked it into another garage to get them fitted, they rang me up an hour later and said that they didn't need replacing at all, nothing wrong with them so he didn't want to rip me off (nice man). He did however tell me that as they are an MOT garage too, his MOT fuy had had a quick look and decided that if he MOT'd it, it would just fail on one top wishbone and the handbrake was slightly out of balance, no biggie. Since it was out of MOT now, I asked him to fail it so I would have 10 days and be legal again, at the weekend I took the part off my donor car and fitted it, sorted. Took it back to the garage, he balanced the handbrake and passed it, yaay! Meanwhile, a couple of days before I had the MOT, the car developed a wobble somewhere, but it's a funny one, I can get in it and drive it for at least 15 mins and all is well, then, all of a sudden, I start getting wheel wobble at 40 getting worse the faster I go. If I leave the car for an hour and get back in it, no wabble etc etc for about 15 mins, then the same. Well, I didn't know how but thought that the top wishbone was the fault when it failed the MOT on it, not it, so I went to a third garage to have the BJ's examined, not play and in perfect order. Everything else with the exeption of one front tyre is just as it was, I figure that if it was the tyre, brake disks wheels or suspention, it would do it all the time? Not got a clue what it can be but when it starts, if I get to around 60 I can almost not hold the wheel, it is that violent. So, anyone got any idea why this should be fine one min and buggered the next? Lat thing to mention, can't see it effecting things but the power steering pump is heating away at it's barrings too, i'll be changing that this weekend. Anyone? any idea? Cheers Rob PS, anyone need ball joints for a MK1 GS, let me know, I seem to have some spare!.

Hey Rob, not seen you here for a while.Only because the OP has a 2002 GS430 and he said it had been made to look like the Sport version. They were the only Sport wheels for the mk2. Yeah Rick, been having a "few" issues of late. had the aircon gassed but the guy who did it said the compmressor wasn't working so I have that to change now when I get the time and the know how. Think I have a water pump issue but it's wierd, sounds like the barring has clanking issues for the first 5 mins of the engine running, then it goes away and sounds fine but when I stop the there is a water leak and it loses all the water in the engine over the next 4 or 5 hours, can't see where it's coming from because if the plastic under engine protector so I have that to remove so I can find the leak too. Have issues with the Radio ariel, I can get the ariel off and see where the new cogged strip goes but can't figure out how it attaches to the mast itself. Was in the middle of doing a tutorial for the drivers door control panel led change but up to and including the fourth soldered led in place all four light up, soon as I solder the fifth in place I am back to only having two of the five lit - this is very head scratchingly annoying. Changed the headlights to HID's last week and now I have to get them re aligned. Was going to fit angel eyes inside the headlights and bottled out at 10 mins in the oven to split the unit, was a little aware that other components would melt before the glue melted so chickened out. I also have a cracked alloy on the back end (the 10" ones) since running over a pothole, when I actually looked at the wheel on the inside, I thought it looked very egg shaped too, this now needs replacing too and you can't really find them any more. Other than that, things are good, lol.

Dis we just jump to the Mk2 here? my centre caps look nothing like that. I have a set of spare ones on my donor car but they need to be rubbed down and resprayed etc, course, the problem then is the L logo in the middle.

Nice

Shame, can't help you buddy, sorry. Is yours completely blank or is it the backlight that's out and the readout is actually working? Another thing to try, just a thought, the guy/girl you bought the GS from could have had an after market unit in there, when they sold the car they could have put that one back in it, it might just be that one of the plugs in the back isn't connected right. Just a thought

Hey buddy, what year is your GS? If it's a 93 - 97, I have a spare one

Scratch that, it had to be something as simple as the pos and neg the wrong way round. A quick snip and solder the red wire to the black etc etc, sorted. Looks wrong but it works, silly Lexus designers.

Erm, damn you teccie folk lol Not sure which is which to be fair, would they have different coloured wires? Here's a question the Steve, what will happen if I switch the wires round and then plug it in again, will it just not work or will something go bang, pop or wheeee! ?

No Steve, on the GS th bulb only has 2 pins, you're going to tell me the the pos is neg and visa verse? Oh, and yes, the ballast is simply fitting between the cars bulb and socket.

Anyone done this on a Mk1 GS? I've been playing with a conversion kit for a couple of weeks now, I have the right type of kit with the right bulbs to do the conversion, it's literally a case of unclipping the normal bulb and plugging in the connector for the new one or so I thought. I can get these bulbs to light up on the desk using a 12V power sully and crocodile clips, when I take it and connect it to the plug that fits onto the bulb, it won't light up. It says on the bulb case that it's a 12V 51W hologen bulb, the ballast needs a 12V power supply to make it light up. WHY THE *&%^"!! CAN'T IT JUST LIGHT UP WHEN I PLUG IT INTO THE CAR'S PROPER PLUG???? AAAAARRRRHHH! Would anyone that already done this conversion know why I am having this problem? I'm completely at a loss Rob

The procedure for this Steve? Cheers

Well, it's been a hot sticky week up here in Gods own country (that's Yorkshire just in case you didn't know), I decided to go and get the old girl gassed up today having already carried out the self diagnostic because my aircon light flashes when I turn it on.(thx for the info Tigerfish) and it coming back with 00 (I understood this to mean that it probably just needed gassing. Well, I was wrong, took it to a very good place who would you believe will check and gas any car for only £30 - Bargain. They have a machine, you just attach the High and Low pressure hoses and off it goes, it checks to see if the system has anything in it still (mine actually did but it turned out to be just a little bit of lubricant, no gas), then it will completely vacume the system for a full 7 mins, then you wait 5 mins or so to see if the vacume remains a total vacume, if not, the system has a leak, mine stayed at absolut zero - no leaks. Then it adds lubricant (in my case, 2ml) and then it adds the gas (in my case 800ml), then it measures the pressure and compares it againsed the data it holds to say what it should be. Bobs your uncle, mine was bang on - looking good. The nice man said start your engine and turn the aircon on, the temp to the lowest.. . . . . . . aircon light still flashing he said, rev at 2000 and keep it there a couple of mins, aircon light still flashing and the air coming out is not cold. He sicks his head under the bonnet again and said AHA!, I know why, your pump is not working, look, it's not turning round at all. He then explained that until it was gassed, the pump would not have switched on anyways so it's not a total waste of your £30. He told me I would need to get the pump sorted out for it to work but if the gas came out during the repair process, he will re gas it for free, what a nice man. Well, I have another gs as a donor for parts and it's aircon is working fine, all I need now is to get it off the donor and fit it to mine. I realise that this is probably gonna be another Tigerfish question but just in case, does anyone have a detailed instruction on how to remove and replace the aircon pump? I guess I may as well do the aux belt at the same time since i'm in there and probably gonna have to remove the belt to get the pump off (that's a down right guess), seen your tutorial for the belt Rick, first class as usuall. Cheers Rob

Yep, That's what I thought. I was thinking about the nice circle one's that they have on BMW's so I got everything I needed including spending a lot of time and effort actually finding the right sort of perspex rod to bend into place to give me two circular rings around my inner bulb housings, would have looked really good but I bottled out of giving the headlights enough time in the oven cuz of the wires that may have gotten damaged. I have about 11 different LED type and sizes to play with but I think they all need to go inside the headlight and I'm a chicken, knowing how much the headlights are worth, I just keep thinking of the replacement cost if I bugger em up. It's ok, you can call me a chicken :ooh-ducky:

So, too vulgar then? You're all right, I was going to put them inside the headlights but to be honest, I removed the headlights and the plan was to put them in the oven to split the seals. Having left the first one in the oven for a very nervous 6 minutes, I simply bottled out fearing the damage to the wires before the heat got to the right place so I could het in there. dropped that and went for the current one. They have been on for a couple of days now and after looking long and hard at them, they are now on the garage floor, I much prefer the true lines and contours without them. A waste of a couple of hours? well maybe but they did serve on purpose, the guy next door with the Audi A3 (the one without the running lights) got a bit jealous and offered me £100 to fit him some ka-ching! - result.

Lol, mark that one up as yet another weird and wonderful quirk of the Lexus! Good result

Was an excellent result though, I must learn this strange concept of saying no

Thought i'd idle away an hour or so having a fiddle, ended up with these, think they are a little vulgar? With Fairy's.bmp

Unles you actually want to have this car up your drive or in your garage while you break it for parts to sell on Ebay or elsewhere, I would walk away. Any trader worth his salt would have put an MOT on that car if it wasn't too expensive and tried to double his money, the simple fact that he didn't means it's not a simple job to get a ticket on it. If I were looking for one of these to drive round in and not have to spend a lot of cash getting it legal, I wouldn't be looking at that one. That's just my thought's, the car might be fantastic and not have an MOT for a very small reason, the seller might just not know what he's doing so it could be a steal. Looking at his feedback however would tend to lead me to the opposite conclusion. Good luck buddy