Leadfoot

Gidday Mate, always nice to have another Kiwi on the boards! (Steve, I'm based in Whangaparaoa if you are looking on google earth Lat -36.582993° Long 174.664193°. Check out my new motorway!) Given your cars age and the description of the problem hopefully it is related to the classic trunk wiring loom fault. Usually the fault occurs when you brake though, the short circuit backfeeds voltage into the ECU in an unexpected way and she gets upset. You state that it always occurs on heavy acceleration, which implies that the kickdown may be involved. I will have a search through the boards (this and the US one are a treasure trove!) and see what we can find. The transmissions are pretty tough, it is more likely to be an electrical gremlin than overheating from SPEEDING!!!. Good luck, and please post any fault codes if you get them. The proper procedure is to read them, wipe the memory by pulling the EFI fuse for more than 15 seconds, then plug it back in and take it for a drive to get the problem, then read the fault codes again. The lexls site is a goldmine. Good luck.

Heat has a big effect on belts, my ex singapore 400 belt was absolutely shagged after only 100,000km. Piece of mind is far better than pieces of scrap aluminium and steel (valves and pistons). You got a bargain.

Finally someone is posting pictures that people from NZ can actually view! The tappets in the no7 cylinder position are a classic "characteristic" of the engine design, apparently the oil feeds weren't perfect and a little wear occurs until the gap is big enough for oil to get in and stop the wear. If you replace the shims it happens all over again. Best to leave it as is, they run forever with it and the best solution is Petes.

I reckon you have a good eye Pete, its only your back that's out! Superb job on the Nav unit, I thought it was a factory finish at first, but then I realised Record don't do a sprayed finish on their vices. :) Sorry to hear that chapters over, next one will still make good reading! All the best mate, Cheers, Marcus.

We all feel your pain. Hopefully that eases the burden.

Snap. I just added sealant under the boot seal in my 98 also to cure this exact same problem. It does cure it too, no problems since, but no mushrooms either. I removed the rear lights and sealed it up then respositioned all the mouldings properly, then the light units hold everything in place.

The trans is bolted solidly to the motor, so even though the lexus V8 is a very smooth unit and has very little shake, if the motor moves so will the tranny. The torque reaction of revving the motor causes some rock. I think the clue about the 1800-2200 rpm is a vital, have you had the codes read?

That 400 looks factory fresh, was it being kept in the fridge? Wish mine still looked that good ..........and I had a spare £10K kicking around. Your 430 is superb Pete, I will be most envious of whoever gets it. Cheers Mate!

The 1998-2000 models you have a single igniter per spark plug. Everything is checked by the computer during running and it will detect misfire in each cylinder and store a fault code. Get somebody with an OBDII fault code reader to check. I would be very surprised if it was plugs, but if they are due for changing nothing wrong with forced maintenance. On the earlier cars the engine, transmission and also the diff mounts could give trouble. Since you have changed the motor mounts and saw improvement, did the trans mount get done too? Won't be the diff though because you said it happens in park too. The fuel injection system has a cutout at the 1800 rpm mark, I wonder if its a fueling problem. Fault codes would report that too. Hope you track it down....

hehe nice upgrade. I want one! (Steve please check your PM's)

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The crank pulley bolt is damn tricky without the right tools. I had my 98 serviced at a toyota dealer because I chickened out of the job. They used air tools to rattle that sucker off, they didn't even have to remove the radiator. However they did manage to leave a camshaft position sensor wire rubbing on the new cambelt and a hundred miles latter the engine went crazy. Easily fixed but even the "experts" get it wrong. I replaced the cambelt (age only, still had miles to go but it was truly stuffed), water pump, tensioners and pulleys and main crank seal. However the camshaft seals were too much work, cams have to be diassembled and the VVti is not user friendly. Good luck!

Thanks for organising it 2D, good effort all.

The early cars had the warning lights in the upper section of the instrument pod and they reflect down to give the "floating" heads up display effect. Kind of like the old arcade computer games used to do. It was not implemented past the mark 2 IIRC. My 98 is the same as yours, it has the warning lights mounted on the gauge panel face.

Hi Alan, What year is your car? I had the regassing done on my 98 recently and that was very cold out of the vents, around 4 degrees according to the specs.

Absolutery. My rego is K17. Hope the weather isn't too crappy, although a bit of rain makes my paint look "factory fresh".

Thanks for the encouragement. As I am in the area picking up the cluster for my 98 I will be dropping in to chew the fat. Cheers, Marcus.

I should be able to berth my old '92 mothership on Sunday at 2pm, looking forward to boosting the LS population by 1 & a bit. (the bit will be the instrument cluster from my 98 LS but that's a long story for Sunday...) Good effort 2D, it can be hard work getting these things to gel.

I will not be able to attend as I am too ashamed. I would not be setting a good example for the LS fraternity with way... 1) my EGR pipe is leaking like the Thames, sounds more like a tractor 2) the seat back all ripped out after the backrest drive shaft sheared when I put the drivers seat all the way down 3 hours drive from home 3) the crazing on my clearcoat looking like frostbite 4) possibly the bubbliest set of factory alloys in existance 5) blacked out temp control panel Sorry everyone, I have let you down.

Great spotting , thanks for the heads up Steve. I did a search of Ebay for LS400 but I never saw this. He has said its available.....and will phone back with a cost. Anybody have a feel for what a pod is worth?

Thanks for your support Steve, yes they did reheat the entire board just enough for the surface mount components to reflow. It continued to have the fault after that and they gave up on being able to fix it. So I took it to another repair shop, who took a week to kill it! Hopefully you will be comforted to know the shops that did this are in Auckland, New Zealand! Perhaps I should give you all some vehicle history...its a Singapore New car that was imported into New Zealand in 2006. Apparently the heat and humidity in Singapore can play absolute havoc with the electronics in these cars (how come I always find this out AFTER I have bought the car with the problems!!). It did run fine for the first 3 weeks and I am fairly certain there was no way that the seller could have "masked" the problem. I am reassured that the problem is rare, and as I commute between the UK and NZ every 6 weeks I should be able to find a good one from here to take in my hand luggage! Thanks again guys.

Thanks very much for the pointers guys, I will get busy phoning in the morning. So far I have been the only one to have this problem.....lucky me! For the record the MK4 is very different in a number of ways. The 1998-2000 model years are interchangable and have the really big multifunction display across the bottom of the RPM and Speed Dials, and of course the 4 gear position indicators since these were the 5 speed years. Attached is the picture from the US (Left Hand drive) manual, so ours are just mirror reflections. There are only three connectors at the back, refer photo, whereas the earlier versions had 4.

Hi, I have been having an absolute nightmare with my 1998 instrument cluster. The car worked perfect for the first three weeks of ownership then it started to misbehave. The gauge needles (RPM, Speed, temp and fuel) would drop to zero readings after 10 minutes driving. However after stopping for 10 minutes the gauges would work again for another 10. Obviously a very slow way to get around. Had the cluster taken out and put into a specialist instrument shop for 12 weeks(@&^*&**&^!!!!!) and they replaced ALL the capacitors and the voltage regulator, even fully resoldered the board by putting it through an oven. They gave up and I took it to another shop to fix it, and they burned the unit out completely. However since the board was given to them faulty they are not taking responsibility for fixing it. So I need to find a replacement cluster for a 1998 to 2000 model year LS400. Does anyone have any recommendations for a reliable source? Is there such a thing as a specialist lexus breaker? Any help to get my very expensive piece of driveway furniture rolling again would be great. Cheers.

I have been to almost half of them, they are a real blast. You see obscure stuff and people from racing history and of course the modern stuff too. What's great is the relaxed atmosphere with full access to the "pits". Well organised and always something new each year. Love the smell and sound of those old Canam racers.

I have seen lots of people in the US forums say this is the solution, let us know how it goes. Good luck.