JellyBean

I have just bought my first LS400 and am very impressed with the car, which only seems to have one fault. Not every time but perhaps once every couple of days the alarm will go off and it seems the only way to stop it is to lock the car with the key rather than the remote !! any ideas ??

If the battery goes completly flat are you still able to open the doors with the key.

Many thanks

Sounds as if the interior motion sensor has gone over-sensitive and needs adjusting. It is quite a common thing. On mine, it was located in/around the centre armrest. Lexus tweaked it and it (amazingly) didn't break the bank.

its only done 63k I have had it since 21k

I would save my money and have it done at the recommended 100,000 miles. It seems they never break anyway.

can anyone recomend a gtarage in south west side of london that could change the canbelt on a LS400 1996

How many miles has passed since belt was last changed?

I must confess Im with the ADAC (German AA equivalent) only because its so cheap & gives me worldwide 5 star cover for 72 euro a year,Ive been rescued from a glacier by them, had a 7.5 tonne camper freed from halfway up a mountain on a Greek Island, with the help of a bulldozer they arranged. My girlfrinds bike recovered & fixed in Portugal & my bike recovered from the midlands. So i think I owe them my 72 euros for a while to come.

Amazing value! I think my Mrs might have had her (my!) money's worth from Lexus Roadside Assistance. Last winter she left the lights on her Golf on all day, while at work. They came out in about 20 mins and got her started. Two weeks later she did it again. They took rather longer to arrive the second time.

I've got the 17" wheels that came on the 2001 LS430. The car was originally on a mixture of tyre makes, Bridgestone, Continental etc. and I got a lot of tyre noise.

Did an internet search for tyre test reports and a name that kept getting good scores for noise, grip and comfort was KUMHO. They are a premium tyre but are relatively cheap as they are trying to enter the UK market. For the past 9 years I've stuck with Michelin, but the Michelins were nearly £200 each and the KUMHO were £100 !

I've now done 8,000 mile on the KUMHOs. They are quieter than the Michelins and just as comfortable, they appear to be wearing just as well and I've had no problems with grip in the wet, dry or snow. I’d recommend them to anyone.

John Nixon

I think people spend far too much on tyres. I have found my Falkens every bit as good as the Dunlops, and quieter. My wife's Golf was running Nexens and, coincidentally, the E-Class estate she now drives arrived shod with Nexens as well. But the Falkens and the Nexens are about half the price of the most expensive brands, who have to pay for their costly advertising campaigns.

Incidentally, the E-class has a 3-litre V6 diesel engine and is every bit as rapid as my 1996 LS. It also uses noticeably less fuel than her 2.3-litre Golf. I have hated diseasels for years, but now I am not so sure...

He phoned up the Austin and actually got through to Lord Nuffield! who arranged for the car to go through the assembly line for a full check and the new clutch system to be fitted.

Erm... great story... but Nuffield died six years before the Maxi started production. (Sorry)

Several people drowned in their cars including a minibus full of workers!

I think perhaps the exclamation mark seems a touch inappropriate here.

Hi I used to work in a dealers, a bloke bought a daimler soverign double six off us & reversed it off the fourcourt straight down a big water mains repair hole in the road outside, he went nowhere forward but managed to clock up about 20 meters backwards.

I cannot beat that but I did read about a woman who thanked the salesman after the handover of her brand new car, got in, drove off the forecourt and a straight under a large passing truck which wiped the front off said brand new purchase. She was not seriously injured. So, a write-off in about 25 metres.

...AND then go to Lexus garage for service to change oil your supply

?

you can bring different oil. and you will pay for only changing it. it will be cheaper service,and lexus stamp in logbook :)

Aha. Worth knowing.

...AND then go to Lexus garage for service to change oil your supply

?

Need to buy two child booster seats for the wife's 'new' Merc estate. I rang Mercedes who sell a seat called KidFix which is made by Britax but with an MB logo. It costs £299.

The same seats by Britax cost £109 each, with free delivery.

Some car manufacturers must think we are daft.

Blimey, why would you want a car with all those gizmos to go wrong and cost the earth to fix !

I know my 1994 LS is dated and doesn't have mirrors that automatically fold in, nor sensors on the suspension height ( why does it have them ? ) to corrode and cost £1500, nor does it have the new fandangled sensor on the front at the radiator ( that helps you stop in case of emergency but which doesn't actually stop you at all ! ) and costs £3500 when it malfunctions ... the size of a mobile phone I'm told .................. am I glad I don't have those gizmos to repair.

And I'm told the cost of replacing a headlight bulb is @ £500 with labour too !

Why would you want a LS430 that was at your own expense to repair ? When one can get a really good LS400 for no money at all and very little repair bills for years and years.

Am I just old fashioned ( rhetorical Q ).

Best wishes with it anyway.

Malc

Malc

This argument does not persuade me! One buys the best one can afford. A 430 is a better car in many ways than an early 400. If you take your argument to its logical confusion, then you must surely advocate buying a Citrõen 2CV!

Your mpg should be similar to the figures you quote. You can quite easily get a genuine 30mpg on a run.

As an example, I have had my 400 for six years and most expensive replacement item, apart from tyres, has been a set of mats which I bought the week after I got it. This sort of reliability is normal.

We need to know your location before we can recommend a Lexus specialist. It is not really worth going to a main agent when the value of the car has reduced to small change!

I bought the LS400 when our daughter was 3 months old - Great car but it was a bad move. We had a Range Rover before and going from something with this level of flexibility to a 3 box saloon was, in hindsight, madness.

The Lexus is not flexible (nor was it ever designed to be) for the usual paraphernalia of pushchairs, travel cots, sterilisers, high chairs etc. etc. that you need when taking on holiday.

The LS is also horrific in the snow and ice - to the point that I shelled out on a cheappie 4x4 just for the winter months. The fact is that I still have it as it just suits the whole family lifestyle and can cope with all the luggage and tat that you throw at it.

The LS was never designed as a family car so I am not knocking the product in any way - Don't do it, it really doesn't work. I have some comical pictures of the LS before we left for a weekend (yes just a weekend!) in center parcs. I even had things on my lap, the journey was misery for all concerned.

The amount of gubbins required for small kiddies is astounding and last year we went away for a week and the entire car & boot were jam-packed. However, the amount of paraphernalia reduces as they get older, mind. For example, a push-chair is a big space-stealer which won't be needed forever. I still consider the car an excellent Alternative People Carrier.

Hi guys,

my advice would be not to bother replacing the bit of trim. Just remove any broken bits that are still attached so it doesn't look scruffy.

I can almost guarantee that as soon as you put a new bit of trim on you will have to park somewhere "nose in" and there will be a curb that is just high enough to smash you new investment. The car is so long that you have to put the nose over the curb or the rear end will be blocking the road.

Look around at other LS400s and there are not that many that have a fully intact lower bumper trim. :winky:

Just my experience of owning a couple of LS400s.

Redsteve.

I agree with every word of this! I like a car to be 'complete' and as soon as my left-hand trim was damaged I replaced it (£37, three years ago). Two weeks later I caught it reversing out of a drive with a steep ramp and it has been busticated ever since.

I am pleased you haven't repeated any of the shots.

Is it a straight 460, or an SE, or an SE-L?

I've a mind to go for the base model as it has a larger boot and is rather quicker off the mark. I am sure many of us would be interested in the most striking differences between your 400, your 430 and your new baby.

I know it's a 9 year old car, but I just haven't seen rust on body panels of any of my cars for so long, I thought they'd cured it forever. This spot has got quite bad - it's just above the silver plastic trim halfway down the door. Looks to me like the trim and the lower plastic panel will have to come off and the whole upper part of the door will need respraying. Just crossing my fingers that this is a freak occurence

Mike

Could it be that your jam jar had a bump there some time in the past and was not repaired by a Lexus Approved Repairer?

ol gord started with "all the promises we are about to make depend on a strong economy" !!! TW*T - in other words - all this is just bull*hit because we wont have a strong economy-hate em all

It's a dilemma. Do we:

Vote for the party which has been making a pig's ear of just about everything?

Vote for a party that thinks it is OK to set a pack of dogs onto one creature to tear it to pieces for entertainment?

Vote for a party who have not governed for about 100 years?

Monster Raving Loony Party, anyone?

Don't you have the option pack which switches off the laws of physics?

I couldn't afford it, I'm afraid. But then again, it would only be something else to go wrong.

jellybean - I would be very worried. What happens if you approach a sharp bend at 60mph and then don't brake in your Lexus? What would happen if you left your Lexus unlocked overnight and someone opened the door and stole your belongings? What would happen if your braked from 40mph in heavy snow as you approached a queue of traffic?

My god, I am seriously worried now and will be returning my 8 year old LS430 back to the dealer and demand a full refund as it is clearly not fit for purpose.

Yes, these risks are indeed frightening. I am thinking of barricading myself indoors, with a large mattress tied around me in case I trip over the cat, and a saucepan on my noddle for good measure.

I see this morning that sales of the Lexus 4WD GX460 are suspended in the US, because consumer reports published a "Don't Buy/Safety Risk" on the vehicle. It seems that under extreme provocation on a test track, the rear of the GX460 "slid out" and they believed this situation could cause a rollover accident. (No such incidents have been reported for this vehicle.)

What worries me is this: I have noticed in my LS400 that if I stamp on the throttle at 20mph whilst negotiating a wet roundabout as fast as I dare, the gearbox kicks down and the tail comes out. Should I give up driving it?

Hello everybody...What are your opinions on the Neo Socket advertised on Fleabay Item number 270559317996...Cheers Roy.

We did a long string recently on another of these daft products. They never do what they claim. Junk.

I got Autocar just to see the how they ended up choosing the Citroen. They judged the LS as having 'probably the best resolved handling of all three cars' and being 'impressive on B roads'. They also mention that the interior is 'remarkably contemporary' for an 8 year old car, and that 'the engine is very very quiet and slick and the driving experience is refined and smooth'.

The stats show that the Lexus is lighter, has more power, better 0-60, higher top speed and less depreciation than the Citroen. Also the LS430 is a 2002 model, whereas the Citroen is a 2006.

Bad point for the Citroen was that the dash looked 'cheap enough to come from a C4'. The LS gearstick was 'too upright', although it seemed to be in the same position as the other two cars in the photos!. The words 'clutching at straws' spring to mind...

However despite all this the Citroen was their choice because it had 'character'. In my experience character can be translated as poor reliability and things breaking on a regular basis.

It seems to me that the majority of the car press just don't want to let themselves like the Lexus brand.

This is a typical Autocar conclusion. Were it a college essay, such a decision after the presentation of the facts would earn a D minus. Autocar is very anti-Lexus. How else could they rate a Maserati as a better LUXURY car than an LS460?

Do you mean this one http://www.lexusownersclub.co.uk/forum/index.php?showtopic=66012

It's in the general club news section ...

TG

Ah! Thanks. I thought we had been censored, like Google.

Where has the DON'T CARE FOR THE NEW LAYOUT topic gone?

Are we in China, or something?