Jon Evans

Some of the parts didn't arrive, so I won't get the car back until Monday now. I was planning to fix the ground strap this weekend but I guess I'll be attempting to do it in the dark one evening next week.

There must be an ancient Japanese art of braiding fine quality cables. They train for 40 years to become a master, and only then are they good enough to weave the ground straps for Lexus vehicles.

I can get these back boxes from Poland for £60 each including shipping! https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/184814082580 https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/154439707841

The car was collected yesterday for a full major service, and in addition I requested the following:

• replace sunroof glass (because the seal is leaking and it isn't available separately)
• replace transfer case oil (I was assured that both diffs will also have their oil replaced as part of the major service)
• aircon regas (I decided to get it checked even though it was already regassed locally, because it's such a complicated system with the unit in the back and the local place didn't even know about the other High port when I went back to them because they lost my port dust caps)
• try to find why it loses coolant, it goes from the Max line to Min in about 200 miles

Whenever I get a new (old) car I like to put it through a full service just so I know where I stand with it. This car had full Lexus dealer stamps for about the first 150k miles but that was only the first few years, it has no real service history after that but it looks like it was only driven about 2k miles per year for the last 8 years or so and the person that had it for 2 years before I owned it did his own work on it and it looks good.

I honestly don't blame a Lexus dealer for offering brand new Lexus parts because that's their job, but the quote was:

• £790 to replace an exhaust heat shield which is no longer attached to the car body - it looks like I can repair it with 4 new nuts and 4 large washers
• £58 for 4 missing straps around heat shield sections that fit directly on the pipes
• £143 for a rusted out bracket that connects both sides of the exhaust to the gearbox
• £2,790 to replace both rear exhaust back box sections because of small holes in the tops of the silencer boxes
• £263 for an earth strap from the transmission to the car body

They also noted that the rear brakes are 50% worn and the disks are rusty on the inside surface - I already have a complete replacement set of everything for those, supplied by the previous owner when I bought the car.

I have approved the replacement of the bracket and 4 missing straps for a total of £326 inc labour but I said no to everything else. I also approved £108 for a block test to see if they can locate the coolant leak, so that report will be interesting to read. I will look for an aftermarket rear exhaust section, possibly https://www.mijexhaust.com which I found already mentioned somewhere else in this forum.

They are keeping the car for another day so I won't get it back until tomorrow.

I just need to wait for the car to be returned so I can crack off those old bolts and work out what size I need.

I was thinking of something like this https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/124938967098

Does anyone have a part number or some aftermarket options for this missing earth strap? The dealer is asking (please make sure you are sitting down) £262.60 for this part. It seems to me that a very generic earth strap should work fine. There's nothing special about Lexus electrons. 😄 

I remember that height sensor repair! I was really pleased with how it turned out. You can get replacement links for about a fiver now on AliExpress 😀

I studied electronics at uni but didn’t end up making a career out of it, I’ve spent my working life in IT so far. I still do a lot of amateur electronics though.

Well, clearly you're not going to have much luck these days with Maplin. 🙂 However, I've had a scout around eBay and I reckon these are probably equivalent:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/353688297804 (100 for £6.99)

There are people selling them in smaller quantities (looks like they fit some Scalextric models), e.g. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/154189018515 (4 for £3.60 so you're not saving much).

This is part 2 of my write-up showing the bulb dimensions. The original bulbs were apparently 3.5mm diameter x 6mm high, and I noted that the Maplin ones were a bit taller but still worked fine. I really need to sort my site out and make it easier to find things 🙂 

https://www.evansweb.info/2009/11/22/ls400-centre-console-illumination-repair-part-2/

Good luck, if you get stuck then pop down to Banbury and I'll help you out.

If you genuinely mean the backlights rather than the displays, I have done this in the past. I was expecting to find LEDs but they were actually small light bulbs. Here’s a write up of how I did it: https://www.evansweb.info/2009/11/15/ls400-centre-console-illumination-repair-part-1/

if it’s the LCD display itself which has failed then it should be easy to swap out, as long as you can obtain a replacement.

Removed the front & rear dashcams from my MINI Clubman today. I hard wired it so I had to dismantle a fair amount of trim. Got all that sorted, then managed to find the cigarette lighter plug and suction cup mount, so it’s installed temporarily in the Lexus for now.

I couldn’t get the A-pillar trim off at all, I presume you’re supposed to cut the top black clip and replace it with a new one?

when I removed the passenger side panel off the dash I could see some non-original wiring, so I’m not sure what is/was previously installed. A job for another day.

Does anyone have info about installing a new fused circuit from a spare fuse position in one of the factory fuse boxes?

The A-pillar trim was completely dry again today… 🤷‍♂️

Hi Niaz. Well, it’s going to the main dealer on Wednesday for a full service and sunroof replacement. The rubber seal has gone, and they only sell it as a complete unit with the glass.

It’s losing coolant slowly, so I need to track down the source of that. Also rather worryingly the left A pillar trim piece was soaking wet after all the rain we had today. Hoping it’s related to the sunroof seal but who knows.

Did a fruitless journey to High Wycombe today and got stuck in traffic on the M40. Did 4 miles in about an hour and a half. My passengers watched Hot Fuzz in the back seat. 😀

Today I picked up my spare wheel with new tyre. When I got the car there was one wheel in particular that needed refinishing, so I bought 4 new tyres and sent other wheel to be sorted. I dropped off the finished wheel for its tyre yesterday, and collected it this morning. For a glorious 5 minutes I was finally driving the car with no warning lights on the dash after getting used to TPMS errors, until I cleaned the screen and the light came on again to tell me I was out of washer fluid.

Welcome to the club, Yousuf.

The LS600hL has the usual set of High and Low ports with a sight glass at the top of the engine, but it also has a second High port and sight glass behind the radiator grille. Does anyone know what the procedure would be?

I know for a fact that the local garage didn't find the port near the grille, because they lost the port caps from the other two. 😞 If they did the usual evac-wait-fill job on those two ports, is my system full now?

It's going to the dealer for a full service next week and I'm tempted to ask them to re-gas it again but on the other hand that's wasted money if it's already done. I got charged £106 from the local garage and that included 900g of gas

Another job ticked off the list. As it happens the fan wasn't all that dirty considering the car is 190k miles and 15 years old. I cleaned it with a small brush, a pipe cleaner, and compressed air.

Currently 50 for £2.71 or 100 for £4.03 inc. delivery if anyone needs them. https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005003032896019.html

6 minutes ago, Illogan said:

At what point do you discover that you've mislaid the fixing 'buttons'?

Way ahead of you - I bought a pack of 100 from Aliexpress 🙂 

The little cover over the motor wires is missing on mine.

Can’t go anywhere until I get some new coolant, so I took the opportunity to clean up a bit. All plastics cleaned and then rubbed down with 303 Aerospace Protectant, and all rubber treated with Gummi Pflege.

I have booked a full service at the dealer to "reset" the car, including replacing the sunroof because the seal is shot. They said they would also have a look at the roof trim while it was in. I know it's going to be expensive (the sunroof is!) so I would like to try fettling the existing trim a bit - if I can get them off and clean them up I can take them to get resprayed. Almost certainly the rubber seal isn't available as a separate part.

I will probably order a bunch of clips before I take them off because at least some of them are bound to snap. I don't know if there's anything special about Lexus pop rivets, but they have a specific part number as well! Definitely looks like the sort of job that's worth paying for an hour of access to the workshop manual before I get started.

Did you manage to get it sorted Niaz?

Yes, here you go:https://www.clublexus.com/forums/ls-4th-gen-2007-2017/457586-diy-info-thread-for-ls460-ls460l-ls600hl-2.html#post7657067

Through the wheel well I think. I know the headlamps are different between the LS460 and LD600, but if you search YouTube for “LS460 headlamp bulb replacement” you’ll find a couple of useful videos which might get you started. One with the wheel on and another with the wheel removed.

One of the things I want to avoid with my car is bodywork issues. Mechanical things I have no problem with, but bodywork terrifies me and there’s no point in ending up with a mechanically sound engine and chassis with a rusting hulk of metal sat on top of it.

This weekend I cleaned the car and noticed a few things that need work. The drip moldings / gutter strips that run from the bonnet to the boot look like they’re lifting a bit, and the rubber seal (?) under them doesn’t look great in a few spots. Due to the drivers side molding rubbing against the wing, there is a spot of rust that’s started to appear on the wing.

As well as eventually getting this booked in for a professional to look at, is there anything DIY I can do in the short term to stop the rust from spreading and give me a few months to get it sorted properly? Preferably simple and idiot proof. 🙂  Can I just sand back the rust to clear metal, and put some sort of temporary primer and roughly colour matched top coat on it? Or even do an extremely localised sanding, followed up with a touch-up pen?

There were a few tiny patches of rust around the floor bungs in the boot so I gave them a quick shot of Dinitrol, but I don’t think that’s going to work well or look too great on a visible part of the body.

Related, what’s the forum’s view of a long running “build log” post about the car? Should I create one to keep track of everything I do with it, or is the preference to keep things in separate posts?