Linas.P

I know you didn't, I am just saying I had constant problems with them.

It is unobtanium guys...

Particularly in UK these were never sold and never fitted to the cars, if any exist then they would be imported from US. In US they were available as optional extra and very few were sold. Don't know the numbers, but it will be "high-hundreds or low thousands", meaning miniscule number. Most likely they were fitted to IS350s and they highly sought after items even in US.

So if you looking for one - eBay.com or maybe ask around in US Lexus forums like IS.my

1 hour ago, DJT said:

Hi everyone it is battery that is at fault. Jumped it off a 2 litre car. Taken car for a 40mile round trip after it started. Going to try a start in a couple hours to see if battery is going to hold charge until I get new battery delivered. Any preferences on make of battery. Not going for cheap battery. Off on Internet to order a battery. 

Bosch S4... also Vatra (I believe it is same as Bosch just different sticker). Then also Exide, but in UK they tend to be very pricey for no reason. Panasonic is what probably was fitted from factory, but I have not seen any place selling them.

Would stay away from Yuasa... this is what you would be commonly offered by places like Halfrauds or KwikFrauds. In my experience you lucky if they last their warranty period. 

2 hours ago, Newbie777 said:

So far I am very happy with device and with it all it's faults, it is something that is a bit of marvel, see it your hand and you understand.❤️

Am sure in 6 months the quality test will reveal it all, but I am not thinking that far ahead😃

Well yes - I guess that is my point. I would be happy to participate in experiment if it would be significantly cheaper... it is significantly cheaper in China. 

So if I visit China like I did in 2018 and I see it for £250, then I would be more than happy to "throw that money away" to marvel at devices from the company that takes risks. I do understand what you saying, but the price of £1700 or £1200 is the price of the tired, tested and reliable device, not prototype which may or may not turn on in 6 months.

Also as I said it is priorities - if I still be upgrading every 6 months as before, then that money would be wasted either way and then it doesn't matter, but when now I keep devices for 3 years+ I started valuing how they last long term. But I also understand different people have different priorities, so for some this totally works and makes sense.

5 minutes ago, ALAW said:

I tend to agree with you Linas i will change this year been with android for a bit now  my wife has Samsung likes them and she never has top end ones. Im leaning towards Samsung like i said above to Niaz I've never considered one of these fold phones ill have to get a look at some in the shop. I too am bit against chinesium ha ha they wont learn a lot of me but i hear what you say about malware and that stuff. So for me Samsung or Apple and do i go for a fold type help me choose. Tell you what these phones nowadays are bloody expensive. 

Yeah, nowadays they have "high-end" and then "true" high-end. As always we can thank apple for this mess - I think they started it with Iphone x, or maybe 11. Basically before you get either Iphone or galaxy S and that was the high-end phone of the year to get, then apple introduced "pro" for like £1500. At first it looked like either you get normal phone or overpay for some gimmick, but now the normal Iphone or Galaxy S are actually mid-range, for example I have S22 and it just feels cheap even compared to my previous S10, because the one to get suppose to be £1500 S22 Ultra (or it was 2 years ago at least, S24 just launched now). Well and obvious they have these foldable phone now which used to cost a lot, but again rumours are Samsung is going to get competitive on pricing again.

As for foldable phones - they are still fragile. When they were not water-proof I didn't even consider them, but I bought Z4 Flip as present and it was quite good, the special screen protector failed after 15 months, but it was replaced by warranty for free. Screen seems to hold just fine for now and Samsung does £150 subsidised replacements. But foldable phones are still fragile in comparison to normal ones, you definitely need to take extra care with them.

I honestly can't care about latest and greatest now, somehow few years back each phone release used to excite me and there was some significant upgrade, but in recent years I really struggle to see what am I getting for extra money. Same applies to both Samsung and apple - I can't even tell the difference between iphones after 12, Galaxy S likewise... last 3 or 4 are pretty much identical... S21, 22, 23 and now 24 really offers more or less the same package. If anything I probably prefer my old S10 (generally would like to have more compact phone, but there are no more compact high-end ones). As such I just keep the phones until they fail now... had S6 edge, to be fair it had not failed, but got quite slow after 4 years, S10 - I cracked the screen after 3 years (still works fine, just glass has chip) and S22 still going strong after 2 years, so if rumours are true then maybe in 2 years time I will pick-up discounted Fold 6. As for all other brands I personally find them irrelevant, so if android then it is Samsung, if not android then it is Iphone... Never found Google Pixel to be any good, Sony, LG, HTC etc. are all pretty much irrelevant now. Motorola is basically chinese company as well and they kind of hang around in mid-range and then there is probably 100 different chinese companies. Generally they have impressive spec sheets, but features are just not polished and do not work half of the time and that is even considering Samsung features are often not fully polished. Also again in my experience they simply fail in less than a year, it starts little by little, but in 12 month it usually turns into brick... sort of maybe camera starts turning off at first, then it doesn't turn on at all, then microphone starts glitching, then people can't hear you anymore and by years' end they stop charging, or holds 4h of charge... or some combination of similar issues.

As for malware - 1 it is real thing, but 2 - I kind of agree, there is nothing useful they can find out about me and I am not planning to go to china at any time soon. So it isn't real concern, but it is there. Also perhaps I would be little bit worried logging in into my banking account, they probably wouldn't bother stealing my 2p worth of savings, but I in theory they could if they wanted to. Also also - that is not to say google or apple does not spy on us, the difference perhaps is targeted advertising vs. "re-education camp" in Xinjiang. That said I think my key issue is their quality and "longevity" and their price isn't even that good in UK. For example I bought Oppo Find X in 2018 when I was in China and my girlfriend bought Vivo something... whatever. Point is in China Oppo Find X costed something like £290, whereas here it only launched year later for £899. And similar story for Vivo, it was even cheaper, if memory serves - like £155. So yes - at those prices they are amazing devices and I don't even care if they last 6 months, but at UK price I just never going to pay £1000+ for chinese phone, for one I kind of know they are not worth it, because they actually sell for maybe £250 in china and secondly, they are made to that level of quality. So yeah - if ever needed "burner" phone for some reason, then I may just get one of the cheaper ones for under £200, but I will never regard them as premium devices in the same league as Samsung or apple.

It does look great and I always wished for smaller thinner Galaxy Fold or Flip, I could even deal with smaller Battery if that is trade-off. 

Recently I was looking at Honor Magic V2, it does look very cool and I like texturing on one side of the phone (almost look like leather texture)... BUT - I just don't trust any chinesium nowadays, Samsung quality is Samsung quality and every person I know who had Huawei, Honor or whatever other stuff comes from China always had issues. They do last ~6Months and then issues starts. I am not even going to go into discussion of chinese malware (it may not be that relevant unless you work for MI6).

Now sure - some years back I would replace phone every 6 months trying to get latest and greatest, so 6 months would not be a deal breaker, but nowadays I use my phones for 3-4 years and therefore I started to appreciate Samsung more, they just get regularly updated, updated for at least 3 years and they usually last just as long. Also I heard rumours that next Fold 6 is likely to be £600 phone, so I may as well wait for that. 

Clean and reapply the grease on the screw which extends steering column. 

Have you checked fuel filter? Also could be some sensor problem where it occasionally reads something wrong and you get drop in power, but generally speaking intermittent problems are the hardest ones to diagnose. 

The problem is not shared parts, there is no such thing as "Lexus Part", they are all stamped "Toyota". The problem is that Lexus overall are becoming just rebadged Toyotas, the quality difference is just not there (expect of models I mentioned), sure you can fit optional ML and leather is nicer in Lexus, but fundamental quality is that of nice economy car, not of affordable luxury car that Lexus of old used to be.

Also Porsche and Audi comparison is now quite correct. Toyota = VW, Audi = Lexus, Porsche in that sense probably would be somewhere near Century. So no Audi does not cheapen Porsche, plus Porsche still maintains unique engines (except in EVs), unique model range and are better quality... and having some Audi part does not really cheapens it too much. Like having "Lexus part" would not cheapen Century. Now this comparison works for cheaper Audi, indeed A3, A2 and later A4 were quite similar to VW Golf/Polo/Passat and indeed that cheapened them. Hence I never considered Audi to be equal to BMW, MB or for that matter Lexus. Sure upper Audi models were comparable and actually good, but that is because they came with engines not fitted to VW and Quattro AWD system, so despite borrowing some of switchgear from VW they made it up elsewhere. Lexus really doesn't make it up anywhere nowadays, identical engines, identical power, list little bit cosmetically different... kind of similar to Acura really, whereas Acura were just rebadged Honda in US. Original Lexus success stems from providing original well above average quality luxury cars, but maintaining Toyota quality and affordable price. That is basically why Lexus succeeded and why Acura or Infinity failed. Now they coming around and basically saying "we are successful anyway, why bother following the techniques that made us successful in the first place".

As for sales - Lexus sales primarily stems from SUV boom, where Lexus do offer some very good and competitive SUVs - NX and RX, those are selling very well, because they are good cars. Even RAV4 won which NX is based is one of best sellers world wide, because it is all around solid vehicle. But in all other segments Lexus is fading away and even in their core segments they are not that much different from Toyota... as I said NX is so closely priced with RAV4, then it is almost possible to call NX a top trim of RAV4 range. Lexus brand itself becoming irrelevant and arguably if Toyota would discontinue it and just sell Lexus cars under Toyota badge they would not lose much. That is what I mean by "fading away".

20 hours ago, Boomer54 said:

If you get a chance have a read of Irwin Stelzer in the Times today holding forth on some of the challenges for the EV market in the states. For example, Hertz selling off a third of their EV fleet , because of the unexpected costs of repair and maintenance. Both GM and Ford slashing their EV production. They can make them ,but selling them is proving far more difficult and ironically  I think it is Ford transferring labour from EV factories back to fossil fuel factories !

Have a read ,because of course the USA may just be a leading indicator of what is to come for European manufacturers.

Contrary to how it may appear I hope EV's do succeed if only to mete out some harsh new realities for some major oil producing countries who really are not friends of the world. However, it is becoming ever more clear that this is developing into yet another government led fiasco of unforeseen consequences and by that I certainly  do not mean the UK govt alone.

I think if there is one truism you can rely upon it is that you will come a cropper developing policies that are being force fed to you by idealists. The latter are invariably 'blind' to anything ,but theirown narrow point of view.

I am not sure US is indicator for how it will work out in Europe. Driving in US is way more popular than Europe (there are exceptions, but in general true), car culture is much stronger in US, people depend more on cars and fuel is still extremely cheap compared to Europe ($3.07/gallon ~ $0.80/litter). So obviously BEV demand in US will be much lower as there is no artificial constrains on ICE like in Europe. 

Now overall, some of the challenges will be similar, BEVs struggle to sell in Europe as well as charging network is not ready yet and we reached the saturation point (I have predicted this for years, those who were here long enough would know I was saying this for at least 5 years), basically everyone that has money and off-street parking and does sort of driving that justifies BEV already has one. Most of BEV sales nowadays are replacement, not conversion, because there is no more demand for growth, infrastructure is not ready to accept any more of BEVs. So that is similar and that is why sales are slowing down, but overall Europe is ahead of US in terms of adoption and will be ahead for foreseeable future. Mainly because in Europe it is much more beneficial to own BEV than in US, we have much more arbitrary charges on ICE and state subsides on BEVs than US.  

10 hours ago, GMB said:

Could be a good thing. All those dirt cheap 3 yr old electric cars available for banger racing soon .

Not really... unless you want to die in toxic inferno.

But on more serious note, crashing BEV prices are still generally good - some people who may benefit from BEV, but could not afford new one could pick-up one nearly new at huge discount. 

Not possible. 

You can use vaccum pump to suck the oil out of dipstick tube, but both drain plug and oil filter are at the bottom of the engine. At very least you would need to jack the car and get under it and it would suck as well, because oil filter is usually hard to remove. Also I would not recommend pumping method, because engine is designed in such way that all the crap accumulates on the bottom of the pan (saying GS250 I assume you have 4GR-FSE), so by sucking the oil out you would leave all the crap in the engine.

On Lexus in general (except of maybe LF-A) the oil change is done from under the car.

20 hours ago, Ala Larj said:

I love driving in n France. Never had problems with the police but the French definitely have a different perspective about auto property than we have. Was waiting at a peage once when the driver in front decided to reverse and join another queue. Straight into the front of me! After I got out and confronted the driver I got the Gallic shrug. It’s not the police you need to worry about but the French lack of auto respect. And best to stay off the roads after the 12 to 2 lunch break! At least every village has a pharmacy if problems occur!!

I agree - I rather drive in any European country than UK, really dread coming back after every trip. Generally, driving culture in France is better than in UK (outside of Paris), but they do tend to cut you off and checking mirrors is not their thing, but unlike UK they move over after overtaking and do not block the road. No respect for other cars thought, small incidents considered "part of driving".

2 hours ago, Vitalijus said:

And do the 245/45 tires require any corrections to the headlights, i.e. raise them up? (My height control sensor (89406-30140) is broken and I'm not going to invest 640 EUR in a new one).

So that depends on the tyre circumference. As I said if you go for 225/50, then circumference is close enough not to cause issues.

2 hours ago, steve2006 said:

in the UK that would result in the annual test (MOT) being failed

Not necessarily, as long as the level of headlights stays correct it would pass. It basically then becomes manual adjust. 

But you right, that is what I have on my GS300. Some idiot somehow managed to brake actuator and previous owner then fixed it with piece of metal and few screws. Looks really dodgy, but in principle it works. 

I think most people replace tyres like for like, very few people I know experiment with the sizes. But from early on I never liked how IS250 handles, my first one was F-Sport with 18", so it is even worse 225/255. I just hate that you come to the corner with RWD car, accelerate mid-corner and it pushes out the front end. It not suppose to be like that. 

And all that is just tyre widths/grip. Wider summer tyres have more grip in dry, so automatically if you get way narrower tyres in front and way wider in rear - your front will lose grip before rear, despite car being RWD. This is done for "safety", because assumption is that driver is inexperienced and will not know how to handle oversteer. Basically with such rear balance you can push car as much in corners.

Again - I assume most of car will have whatever was fitted on them from factory, so they will have 245s in the rear. But that is neither best tyre size for the car, nor really there is any need to stick with it. As for 245/45/17 not being most common tyre size in general... yeah it could be.

For winter tyres 100% 225, they will actually be better for driving in winter, you can also go for 225/50 if you want to keep speedometer indicating somewhat similar speed as before. I had square 225/50 for winter and they were great.

For summer, I had 235, 245 and 255 and I probably would go for 225 or 235 in future. Basically, 245 and 255 in my opinion ruins the balance of the car. Lexus did it deliberately, because understeering is considered "safe" by those who can't drive, but I find it just annoying. 225 in front and 235 in rear would give you perfect balance, or as close one could get to it i.e. car would neither understeer, nor oversteer and if you go past the limits all 4 wheels will slide (which in IS250 is not very likely). Square 225 set-up would make IS250 feel like RWD car should and there would be slight oversteer, which could be fun combined with the right skill. And I don't mean it would be unsafe or anything, it is not very powerful car, 225 is plenty to keep it on the road, but the balance will be little bit more natural for RWD, little bit of oversteer. Nice bonus - if you have square 225, then you can rotate the tyres and that means set will last longer as you can wear them down more evenly. Keep best tyres always in the rear. That said 225 will look a little bit silly in the rear on standard wheels and offsets, so 20-25mm hub centric spacer would be nice.

Also remember entry-lever IS250 came with 205/55/16... so 225 is really PLENTY for this car.

1 minute ago, Hatat said:

Lucky escape lol well best is to drive sensibly and not risking a fine when there are speeding cameras.

Little bit harder to do on Autobahn. I was flashed in kind of stupid place also - so it was unlimited speed where I was doing like 230-240, then on long downhill there was a sign for 130, I noticed the sign and let-off (I never brake, only let off and let the car slow down), then 100m later another sign 110 and 25m later bunch of speed cameras. So when I let off it dropped to maybe 180 before the speed cameras. Then probably another 200m later it is unlimited speed again. So looked literally like deliberate speed trap for sole purpose of flashing people.

Not sure what were the fines in Germany back in 2016 (I know since then they have increased them), but I can't imagine it would be small for 70 over. 

Even before that it was rare to get the fine. I was stopped in Germany once - probably in 2016 or something like that and they wanted to impound my car for unpaid fines. But the fines were 3 years ago and I have acquired the car 6 months ago, so I was good to go. And that was the same trip when I got flashed in France twice and also once in Germany and never got any fines from either.

Either change the car or put different plate on it. 

8 minutes ago, Hatat said:

Glad to know you didn't get any fines via post but are you saying you were flashed twice for using a navigator or speed? 🙂

Flashed probably for speed, also suspect I passed trough the city which had Crit'Air without registering (which by the way you may need to get). You can't get fines from Europe now. Which is kind of double edge sword - so you don't have to pay them, but if you go back few years later and you have several big fines they may stop you and impound the car. But it has to be many and big fines for them to bother, they won't be chasing you for 1 fine for 12 Euros. 

4 minutes ago, GMB said:

Yep, has happened to me on a few occasions. They are not "bad" people just stooopid!  They will even do it while you are sitting in the car!!!!

100%... because as I said for them it is not considered an issue. And if you challenge them they will be confused what you want... maybe they will say "pardon" just being nice, but otherwise they will be like "what an ffffing idiot, starts shouting about the scratch... those foreigners are weird... it is just a car, it mean to be scratched". 

And this is not some sort of "stereotype" from Top Gear or something - they really do not care about cosmetics of the car, they certainly would not be able to comprehend "detailing". 

2 minutes ago, GMB said:

Mine's 12 yrs old this coming September and still drives like new. Nil spent on repairs ( apart from consumables and servicing over the lifetime ) believe it or not. I can't see any point in changing it to buy an expensive depreciating money pit that is easily stolen and full of unwanted gimmicks.  Maybe I'm just old fashioned?🧌🐈‍⬛

No - it is just like Lexus are. Also if you have ~ 2006 onwards Lexus, it already has 95% of features that even most modern cars lacks. Things like heated/cooled seats, memory etc. Thinking about it - the only thing my 2006 car does not have is little warning light for cross-traffic and lane change. I am retrofitting radar cruise later this year. The TPMS sucks, because it has it, but does not show individual tyres, which makes TPMS redundant and just annoying. And honestly I can't even think of what feature it does not have that new cars do? Traffic sign recognition maybe, but it is such a minor thing, GPS shows speed limit anyway. So really no point of replacing them. 

2 minutes ago, GMB said:

When I was there, visitor or not, you could be fined on the spot for having any device which revealed speed camera locations; Tom Tom, factory, GPS whatever. I think that may still apply

That is correct... It is preventing course of justice in their view. But as I said by now all the devices automatically hide the camera location so won't be an issue. 

Other note - French will absolutelly smack your car with their doors and don't even look back. It is 100% normal and not considered an issue... it is almost like national hobby to hit each other cars and trade some paint. And I don't mean they do it deliberately, or carelessly or in some bad way - no for them, they just can't comprehend that being an issue, in France it is ALRIGHT to hit other person's car when opening the doors. So beware of where you park. 

This was mine few months ago and I was parked in the corner of the car park by the beach. 

1 minute ago, PDM said:

Linas,

Assuming the thefts are gen 4 RX models, it's about 5% of all UK sold vehicles.... in 1 year.

Paul

That would be ridiculous, hopeful it is not only 4th Gen. But if it is, then I now understand some owners being extremely concerned.

2 hours ago, Sandandlime said:

Being France, everything is complicated. I haven't checked the regulations for some time and there was talk of not showing alerts on navigation apps but its never been an issue as far as I can tell. My TomTom, which I use in my old girls when useful certainly warns of there presence, was purchased here and receives updates for France. Allegedly it avoids legal issues by highlighting 'Danger Zones' instead. When I purchased my ES it came preloaded with Coyote which gives route guidance based on live information but also announced speed cameras, including mobile ones. 

I believe Waze also announces Hazard Zones which is usually a euphemism for a camera. I'm not sure about Google as I don't use it but understand the camera option is turned off when operating in France though maybe that's also update with hazard warnings?

Whilst driving in France differs from the UK its still fundamentally a civilised country with very much quieter roads, outside of the cities at least. In general if the 'don't be a ******' approach is adopted driving is pretty stress free (okay, too many like to park in your back seat but they're best just ignored). If the 'I enjoy being a ******' approach is hard things stop being fun.

Just chill and enjoy the trip.

Yeah - all the apps... Google Maps, TomTom, Waze etc. all do NOT show speed camera locations automatically when you in France. On the positive side (depending on your perspective) you will never get French fines. I have been flashed few times last year and haven't received anything (not sure why, to be honest as I wasn't going that fast, I think once 77 in 70). Also in my previous car on my way out of France and into Belgium I have forgotten I am not in Germany yet and definitely been flashed twice for speed (this was in like 2016) and never got any fines either.  

16 hours ago, RichGS11 said:

It only had admiring attention and one of them recorded me leaving. 

That is quite good way of looking at it - because in France they don't have modified cars they are actually quite amused of seeing them. And unless something is dangerous or ridiculous it is more of positive attention, not in a way of trying to punish you (even if they could, which for most mods they can't). 

6 hours ago, Tickedon said:

The Lexus RX has made a top 10 list of stolen cars… it’s also much more likely to be stolen than a Fiesta (given how many more Fiestas are on the road compared to relatively few RXs!).

Yeah - spot on, it seems it is not big issue before one realises that that 884 RX represents significantly higher proportion of cars than 6015 Fiestas. 

Also note - RAV4 which is most vulnerable car for stealing is also in 6th place. 

1 hour ago, Thelongterm said:

Tell more. The Jap IS350, is it hard to insure in the UK? Is it easy to get parts, etc?

It is 90%+ same as IS250, with exception of engine and gearbox, also bigger brakes, but they are the same as GS300/GS450h. So parts are not (more) of an issue than for IS250.

As for insurance - as mentioned you need specialists who does insurance on imports, although I would not bet on "same price as UK cars" or "insurable at all". Basically if you live in countryside and you are driver with a lot of NCB and generally pay little for insurance it may be true that it will cost the same, however one may find that they simply CAN'T insure imported car at all. Probably should not apply to anyone above 30 years old with decent driving history, but still  -insuring imported car is little bit more tricky.   

On 1/24/2024 at 9:37 AM, H3XME said:

250 manual and 3GR swap it because you can use stock ECU.

Swapping IS250 automatic is easier, as it is literally plug and play. IS250 manual is also simple enough, just need to tidy-up some unnecessary wiring for gearbox.