jonathanhague

The Lexus diagnosis was disappointing - I actually went to my Lexus indy first but they don't work on the hybrid system. They told me that they could read the codes but wouldn't do the work and recommended that I went to Lexus for this. They did however remark that the problems with the actual hybrid components are rare from when he worked at Lexus and to be careful as the technicians aren't always as experienced as they would be with all things mechanical on the car. I think when chatting to the chap from HBS he said a similar thing. He is an electrician. Again, another thing I should have made clear earlier was that when I put the code that Lexus gave me (P0A7F) in to google, virtually none of the results mentioned smart battery ecu. I have it in writing too as they printed a quote for me.... I just wish I didn't live so far away from Northampton!

My Lexus was £800 - other models I think vary by price, but there are indicators of costs on the website. I forgot to mention that it comes with a 10,000 mile / 1 year warranty as piece of mind. I won't post the link but if you type Hybrid Battery Solutions Northampton in to a search engine it should come up!

Hi all, Just wanted to post a quick review regarding Hybrid battery conditioning. I think it was off this site I learned of Hybrid Battery Solutions based in Northampton who I contacted after getting a diagnostic from Lexus. The car lost it's initial surge of power from the battery and would always move off using petrol engine only. Battery indicator would drop to purple very quickly. MPG dropped from about 29/30 to 23-25mpg. I had a CHECK HYBRID SYSTEM message, but it was solid - not flashing check VSC etc as others have described. Lexus ran two separate diagnostics and said it was a smart battery ECU which needed replacing at a cost of £1250 + vat. They gave me a print out of the error code and when researching online it was more common that it was 'Battery pack seriously deteriorated'. I couldn't find much literature regarding the smart battery ECU other than a workbook note suggesting that this is replaced first then if this doesn't work, the battery pack should be replaced. Not knocking Lexus at all but I wasn't overly convinced or filled with confidence. My car is probably only worth £3000-4000 (ambitious?!) and has 150k miles so didn't want to pay for this smart battery unit and then a battery if it didn't work! Using my logic I thought it was more likely than not to be the battery - after all, all batteries do degrade and this seemed to be much much more common when looking online. I contacted Richard at Hybrid Battery Solutions in Northampton who gave some advice and we had a chat about hybrids generally - in fact, we didn't even discuss him 'selling' me his service until I asked (always a good sign I think!). Anyway, cutting to the chase I drove from Teesside to Northampton and averaged 26.2mpg. Left it with Richard for the week and I was astonished when I got it back. It felt like it had been remapped - it was better than before (probably cause I never had from brand new myself). On the same journey back (about 190 miles) I averaged 38mpg. Even after almost a week of short journeys, spirited driving (and traffic light drag racing again ) I am still on 33.4. I am almost gutted that I didn't go for the grid charger (which I think uses some kind of witchcraft to keep the battery cells in their best possible condition) but I might well need a bigger boot to fit a pushchair later on in the year so the car might go although with hindsight, this would have been a good selling point when selling the car. He can do this separate from conditioning I believe or both at same time. It has given me confidence to go and buy another higher mileage hybrid. There is a solution which is significantly cheaper than Lexus and urge others who were in my situation to have a look at this. Hopefully this isn't breaking any forum rules - it's just my experience of this company and that others find it informative.

Has anyone else had their GS450h shocks refurbished/reconditioned?

I've read some interesting posts on here and elsewhere. I have two rear shocks which are leaking (not just misting) but not sufficient to fail the MOT. My garage has contacted his local motor factors and can source them, but eye-watering prices each. Lexus will sell them at £311 each. This seems to suggest that they will fit. I'm not convinced, and don't know whether they would be compatible with the AVS? http://www.jcwhitney.com/pro-comp-es9000-shock-absorbers/p2020609.jcwx?filterid=c12548d17948y2007g2u0j1#PDPProductDetails I wasn't expecting to find anything this cheap but 9/10 you can generally find parts cheaper by searching around online. Any comments or suggestions would be appreciated.