Rabbers

Admirable thinking, Glyn, which should generally be applied, in my view, to all manner of prized artefacts, whether industrially produced or hand-crafted.

Of course, Anthony and Glyn, you should do exactly as you please in modifying the looks of your SC430s, but wouldn’t it be more appropriate to try and restore so beautiful a car to the appearance originally intended by its designers?

Malc, I’m guessing your sad-face reaction relates to my rude comment about the original LS400, but you should remember this was 1990. My tastes have moved on since then. At the time I confess I was more than a little dazzled by the hype and razzmatazz of what must have been one of the first and biggest Lexus dealerships. Certainly I had seen nothing remotely like it in Europe. I remember eight well-waxed LS400s, mainly silver, some blue, each with its own set of spotlights, arranged in a circle around a mammoth sales desk from which a salesman of appropriate Japanese-American ethnicity held forth with wondrous, albeit somewhat cloying, fluency. No doubt it was a vision of Paradise for LS lovers.

And there was I thinking The Guardian was one of the last bastions of literacy notwithstanding its contents.

I suspect this is an evolutionary revision of consumer messaging on the part of Lexus’ ad agency in order to broaden the marque’s original image from being excessively U.S.-centric. I first heard the Luxury Export United States explanation in 1990 as part of a salesman’s spiel in a flagship Lexus dealership in Chicago close to my employer’s HQ, and I don’t think you can get closer to the horse’s mouth than that. Please don’t get the idea I was in the market for an LS400 as a company car back in Europe (I actually thought it was too big and too flashy). The price converted from dollars was about twice my entitlement. I had merely tagged along for a lunchtime visit with a couple of droolingly enthusiastic senior colleagues whose hankering for one was ultimately frustrated by our Chairman’s hatred, as a Pacific War veteran with bad memories, for all things Japanese.

I previously thought (and still think) that LEXUS is a compression of the acronym L.EX.US meaning LUXURY.EXPORT.UNITED STATES, by which code was the Toyota corporation originally denoted its project of designing and producing a high-quality marque initially intended for the U.S. market. An added bonus derived from a semantic association with the Latin word “LEX”, meaning “LAW”, which carries the connotation of a very high standard to which all employees associated with the project should adhere and prospective customers understand, i.e. the marque purported to lay down the law by which quality standards should be judged. Clearly, the association with masculine singular Latin nouns ending in “-us” is purely coincidental, and therefore in no way contradicts the correctness, in English, of the plural form of the proper noun LEXUS being LEXUSES. Having said all this I nevertheless continue to believe that one should use whatever plural form of the name takes one’s fancy or trips easiest off the tongue (or keyboard).

I doubt if Lexus customers, wherever they are, can realistically argue, even on the basis of occasional or single-dealer cross-border experiences, whether services are better in some countries than others, or whether dealer issues vary in nature and importance. No doubt Lexus/Toyota management has standard performance monitoring methods of its own in place through local subsidiaries, and the country-by-country data thereby gathered will in the first instance serve to objectively assess how well or badly individual country managements operate and control the activities of their dealer networks. As customers we are not privy to this data. All we know, regardless of country, is that some dealerships reportedly give better service than others, refuting the historical claim that all Lexus dealers provide good service all of the time. Of course, this benchmark claim was never true and would have been better expressed in terms of likelihoods in respect of Lexus' competitors. The question is whether these likelihoods are getting slimmer, and if so, why? As for me - and I believe for most of us - dealer/customer relations remain good and the service I receive satisfactory,, and long may this last.

No.

The LS disappeared from the French and Italian Lexus websites for a few months last year, only to reappear and, as of today, remain there.

I’m not sure about the customer selection being random since I get the email quality questionnaire (usually promptly the same evening) after every service or other job carried out by my dealer, so it is likely that the personnel can easily guess which customers have or have not deprived them of financial benefits. I understand these benefits are conditional to the average mark received by a dealer in a given number of questionnaires not dropping below 8.5/10, in which event an inspection by Lexus/Toyota will ensue, as it more quickly will if the low mark is accompanied by a number of seriously negative customer comments of an identifiably similar nature.

I drive through Liechtenstein maybe two or three times a year (which takes about 15 minutes if you keep to the speed limits, which is probably advisable), and have never been stopped, not even at the border points. In the unlikely event you are stopped, and unless your car poses an evident and serious safety risk, in which case it would be sequestered, any administrative irregularity would merely result in your being asked to leave the country forthwith. I base this on Swiss police practice, which I would guess Liechtenstein probably follows, as it does in most things.

I have been using mainly the same dealer for almost twenty years and would also say that the service has by and large remained good and the customer experience pleasant (at least until the moment I see the bill). What I find rather disconcerting, however, is that there appear to have been more personnel changes at the dealership in the last five years than in the previous fifteen. No doubt there are many possible explanations for this, both social and economic, but it means that I, as a customer, have a greater love for the brand than the people for whom it provides work. Which may mean very little or maybe nothing at all, but is nevertheless something for me to ponder.

There are increasing numbers of complaints in various LOC forums about poor dealer service, including some real horror stories. I think we are witnessing a natural generational change for the worse in the level of customer treatment provided by Lexus dealerships, not merely in the U.K. but throughout Europe. The main cause, in my view, is the inevitable disappearance of many or most - and perhaps in some cases all - of the people who operated the dealerships when Lexus was a young brand. Both management and staff were motivated by the need to constantly try harder than competitors, with the result that they collectively succeeded in giving Lexus a reputation for offering the best service in the industry. This reputation, alas, is showing signs of deterioration alongside the dilution of the image of exclusivity - which was itself a motivational factor for dealers and customers alike - deriving from the compound effect of higher sales and an ever increasing number of ageing cars being brought in for servicing.

Great phrase, that. I think I’ll use it whenever I can in future. Contains a lot of alliteration as well as meaning.

My visits to the UK in recent years have been limited to London, so I have no idea how good or bad the roads might be in the provinces and countryside. I can only say that news stories such as the one about Rod Stewart, no less, feeling the need to repair the potholes in his street, added to the grumbles I hear from British friends as well as LOC members, are not exactly of a nature likely to encourage foreign car tourists. As regards London I confess I was surprised to spot a few minor potholes in the sort of well-heeled neighbourhoods where even smaller and less serious ones would once have been repaired overnight so as not to inconvenience the local ratepayers.

Because tyre manufacturers’ noise claims are quantified on the basis of testing on smooth surfaces - and, as you say, John, it would make no sense for them to do otherwise - they rarely reflect real life except in countries where the road networks are of recent construction or are properly maintained. Still, one gets one’s pleasures where one can, and, on familiar routes, I look forward to the moments when the car comes to the end of stretches of bad road and enters smooth ones, for which recent repairs can usually be thanked. The relative silence can be almost eery, but it is always nice.

I haven’t followed Clarkson for many years but am surprised to hear that he still manages to irritate people. Surely what he says about a car is less important than the entertainment value he aims to provide by saying it (not always successfully).

Yes to the first question. Maybe or maybe not to the second.

I have the uneasy feeling that this thread might be hurtling unchecked towards the same fate as its “Conspiracy Theories” predecessor. So, before it’s too late, I would suggest it be re-started under a new name by one or another of its more ardent devotees.

… but happy, I hope!

Yes, it would be nice if other manufacturers were to come out with the correct sizes. As regards the cabin noise level, I am finding the SCs perfectly acceptable, but I think you’ll agree (especially in view of your long Bridgestone pedigree!!!) that noise levels mainly tend to increase as tyres age. If the SCs become noticeably noisier after, say, 5000km, I’ll report it. Interesting that noise ratings are external/drive-by readings, but I would think these are nevertheless a viable indicator of in-cabin acoustic comfort in brand comparisons. Not that the figures seem to differ much from one brand to the next.

Now that you’ve found the RC forum, Euan, I suggest you spend some time exploring the many past threads in the certainty of finding answers to most your questions as well as many more. I don’t recall any threads about 3M wrapping though.

No pain, but thanks for the thought. I’m far from looking to cut back on the cost of UHP tyres (not that I don’t look for deals on them) at the expense of my peace of mind, but merely noting a regulatory oddity whereby officialdom would allow a Q speed rating for the size(s) of winter tyres it prescribes for my car when it obvious they do not exist. Not, of course, that it matters in reality since I buy what I must at the best price I can get. Yes, 245/40/R18 Y rear winter (and summer) tyres would be illegal on my RC300h F-Sport, though not, I believe, on the normal model. On twice-, or more, yearly drives from Italy to Denmark and back I regularly keep up speeds of 160-180kmh for long stints where allowed on the autobahn, adding up to maybe a bit more than one-third of the length of Germany, regardless of whether I happen to be on summer or winter tyres, and in the latter instances I have indeed always been grateful for a high speed rating such as, latterly, the W of my Pirelli Sottozeros. As regards a higher speed rating meaning a better performance at any speed, I wouldn’t presume to disbelieve Big Tyre.

I had come to the same conclusion as you, David, and recommend you keep an eye out for any good deal on them. This last change of tyres was the first time I have had any kind of availability problem for a complete set of PZeros. On two previous occasions when I replaced the OEM tyres, Bridgestones the first time and Dunlops the second, it was primarily on the basis of immediate availability and a marginally better price for PZeros than Goodyear Eagles, these being another brand with which I had been happy in the past. Michelin PSs and Conti SCs - I don't remember the generation numbers - were also readily available, but at significantly higher prices - maybe by 20% or more, as I recall - than the Pirellis, which I had in any case always found satisfactory. When I decided to change to summer tyres this last time it was much earlier in the year than usual because of my alarm at the sudden appearance of several patches of surface crumbling on all four of the winters, almost certainly as the result of several weeks - indeed months - of unseasonably warm temperatures unsuited to the tyres. I was therefore quite excited to be offered a set of of SC7s for around the same price, namely €925, as I would have paid for my usual PZeros had the 265/35 rears not been "momentarily" unavailable. And, as will be clear from my OP, I am far from regretting the purchase. In fact, perhaps because they are now fully "bedded in", the SCs seem to have got even better.

What’s crazy is that no premium tyre companies produce UHP winter tyres in sizes of 17” and above with a speed rating anywhere as low - or prospectively as low-priced - as the Q permitted by regulatory authorities, V or thereabouts being the norm.