Change odometer from miles to kilometers

[BrunoLeal]

Hi guys,

I just got information from Lexus Ireland (M50 North garage) that to change the LFA style display from miles to kilometers they would need to change the full display and code the new one which would cost me more than 5.000eur. 

I find this really strange. How come an electronic part needs to be replaced to change this type of information? I could change this in my BMW easily, for example.

I like Lexus quality but their costumer service and maintenance costs are absolutely ridiculous.

Can anyone confirm that in fact the only way to change the odometer from miles to kilometers is to change the full display?

Note: I'm talking about the odometer where the mileage of the car is accounted. I know that we can change mpg to kpl (or l/100km).

[ianhu]

May I just ask. What's it defaulting to now when you turn on the car?

I have eeprom 93a66 for is300h fsport

This is in miles not kilometres

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[Thackeray]

I switched the odometer from miles to kilometres while in France recently. It helps when the signs and distances are in kilometres. I would imagine you can do the same. The manual says the choice is Km (with litres/100km), Km (with km/litre) or miles (with mpg). This doesn't affect the speedometer, of course. Mine is in mph in big numbers and kph in small numbers. I can't remember the exact location in the settings to change this, but it isn't difficult to find - possibly under Vehicle, according to the manual.

[BrunoLeal]

Hi guys,

I'm talking about the LFA style display:

The MPH and consumption I can change. What I can't change is the odometer (lower right in the picture). The car's mileage is no issue to me, the problem is that the options to count the mileage for different trips is also in miles and that is really unfortunate as I'm in Ireland (car is imported from UK).

I really find it strange that a digital cluster like this doesn't support some kind of coding to consider kilometers instead of miles. Needing to change the cluster is just stupid. :)

Thanks,

Bruno

[BrunoLeal]

3 hours ago, ianhu said:

May I just ask. What's it defaulting to now when you turn on the car?

I have eeprom 93a66 for is300h fsport

This is in miles not kilometres

Sent from my SM-G965F using Tapatalk
 

The car is imported from UK so now is in miles. What exactly is that eeprom 93a66?

Thanks,

Bruno

[ianhu]

The eeprom stores the mileage.

I had to repair mine when I bought my car since the odometer was stuck at a particular mileage.

The eeprom is holds the hex values that are your travelled milage. Mine was knackered.

I had to remove the small surface mount eeprom, programme a new one with the correct mileage then solder it back on the board. To be fair I ended up soldering an eeprom socket to the board so I could easily remove the eeprom during the trial and error of getting the right hex values. It's correct now but need to take apart dash, remove socket and re solder the chip back to the board.

I'll get around to it soon I guess. For now the eeprom is in the socket working fine.

So heres the thing. So hex data on that chip depict km or miles. This infomation is not readily available. If it can be determine what needs to be changed in the hex it's simple then.

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[steve2006]

Oh goody hexadecimal eeproms, I’m only going as far as FFFF 🙂

[Thackeray]

2 hours ago, BrunoLeal said:

What I can't change is the odometer (lower right in the picture)

How strange that it doesn't change. When I choose Setup, General, Units of Measurement, and then change Miles to Km, the total mileage on the odometer, as well as trip A and trip B all recalculate the distance covered from miles to kilometres. (I've just tried it.) The absolute figure must of course be stored somewhere (the eeprom) but the non F-Sport display calculates the equivalent kilometres from the stored miles (or vice versa) and displays whichever you've chosen in Units of Measurement. It seems very odd that F Sport models don't have this facility when lesser models do.

[BrunoLeal]

9 hours ago, Thackeray said:

How strange that it doesn't change. When I choose Setup, General, Units of Measurement, and then change Miles to Km, the total mileage on the odometer, as well as trip A and trip B all recalculate the distance covered from miles to kilometres. (I've just tried it.) The absolute figure must of course be stored somewhere (the eeprom) but the non F-Sport display calculates the equivalent kilometres from the stored miles (or vice versa) and displays whichever you've chosen in Units of Measurement. It seems very odd that F Sport models don't have this facility when lesser models do.

That's even worse...basicaly what Lexus is doing is disabling people to change from miles to kms in a fully digital display but enabling it in a half digital display...well done Lexus...clever...

[BrunoLeal]

10 hours ago, ianhu said:

The eeprom stores the mileage.

I had to repair mine when I bought my car since the odometer was stuck at a particular mileage.

The eeprom is holds the hex values that are your travelled milage. Mine was knackered.

I had to remove the small surface mount eeprom, programme a new one with the correct mileage then solder it back on the board. To be fair I ended up soldering an eeprom socket to the board so I could easily remove the eeprom during the trial and error of getting the right hex values. It's correct now but need to take apart dash, remove socket and re solder the chip back to the board.

I'll get around to it soon I guess. For now the eeprom is in the socket working fine.

So heres the thing. So hex data on that chip depict km or miles. This infomation is not readily available. If it can be determine what needs to be changed in the hex it's simple then.

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Thanks ianhu, I believe to change from miles to kms will be a little bit more than repoprogramming an eprom. The car needs to start calculating the distance in the new measuring units too. I would say this needs some changes at software level if I understood correctly what info that eprom contains.

[ColinBarber]

16 hours ago, BrunoLeal said:

I find this really strange. How come an electronic part needs to be replaced to change this type of information? I could change this in my BMW easily, for example.

It is a simple thing to implement but if it hasn't been designed to be changed from miles to kms then it needs to be replaced. BMW do it so they can saving money by just having one part, Toyota normally have dedicated parts for LHD and RHD vehicles, and ones that as sold to countries that use MPH or KM/H.

I guess for 99.99% of owners there is never a need to change the odometer units.

[ColinBarber]

16 minutes ago, BrunoLeal said:

Thanks ianhu, I believe to change from miles to kms will be a little bit more than repoprogramming an eprom. The car needs to start calculating the distance in the new measuring units too. I would say this needs some changes at software level if I understood correctly what info that eprom contains.

They would depend on what is stored in the prom. It may well be that something like meters or wheel revolutions are stored, and is converted to the units required, which allows it to be easily changed on the fly.

[ianhu]

Yes. I doubt that lexus made two different instrument clusters, one to calc miles and other to calculate kilometres.

Both algorithms for that will be on the same unit. Like the BMW example. The question is how can it be flipped from one to another

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[BrunoLeal]

54 minutes ago, ColinBarber said:

They would depend on what is stored in the prom. It may well be that something like meters or wheel revolutions are stored, and is converted to the units required, which allows it to be easily changed on the fly.

That would be great. The problem is to find someone in Ireland that understands about this and can actually reprogram the eprom safely! :)

[BrunoLeal]

1 minute ago, ianhu said:

Yes. I doubt that lexus made two different instrument clusters, one to calc miles and other to calculate kilometres.

Both algorithms for that will be on the same unit. Like the BMW example. The question is how can it be flipped from one to another

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Exactly. And that's my point. I would expect Lexus dealers, even without the expertise inhouse, to be able to get all instructions from mother Lexus to do this kind of job. Bottom line is money they could get...

[ianhu]

Bruno I informed you how I reprogrammed the eeprom. Lexus wont be interested in that. They very much wanted to sell me a brand new cluster with '00000' on the clocks.

I would go as far to say they have no knowledge at a circuit component level locally. All that is at the R&D people at lexus.

I think IF there is a way to switch from miles to Km then they should know to process.

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[Thackeray]

14 hours ago, BrunoLeal said:

The MPH and consumption I can change. What I can't change is the odometer (lower right in the picture).

Just out of interest, what does the display look like when you change it to kph?

Does the range change to kilometres, while the odometer (1572 miles in the picture) stays as it is, labelled with miles?

[ianhu]

I think thqy picture is grabbed off internet yeah??

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[MotorDevil]

I imported an F-Sport from the UK to Ireland earlier this year and the speedo and odometer change to kilometres, its in the settings somewhere. So don't go too harsh on Lexus just yet! 

I'll have a check over the weekend if you haven't found it by then. 

[cruisermark]

10 minutes ago, MotorDevil said:

I imported an F-Sport from the UK to Ireland earlier this year and the speedo and odometer change to kilometres, its in the settings somewhere. So don't go too harsh on Lexus just yet! 

I'll have a check over the weekend if you haven't found it by then. 

If what you say works for the OP then Lexus dealer has some explaining to do!

[MotorDevil]

1 minute ago, cruisermark said:

If what you say works for the OP then Lexus dealer has some explaining to do!

Yes, you are right, its pretty bad that Lexus (Dublin) don't know about this, they probably haven't seen many with the F-sport speedo and think its like the normal non-F-Sport ones.

When I said don't be harsh, it was more so on Lexus the manufacturer that they didn't add this to the digital display. 

 

[matt8]

I just tested my F Sport, switched it to KM/H (speed and fuel economy measures) but the odometer remained in miles per hour.

Couldn't see how to switch odometer from miles to KM.

[Thackeray]

1 hour ago, MotorDevil said:

I imported an F-Sport from the UK to Ireland earlier this year and the speedo and odometer change to kilometres, its in the settings somewhere.

 

42 minutes ago, matt8 said:

I just tested my F Sport, switched it to KM/H (speed and fuel economy measures) but the odometer remained in miles per hour.

If I had to guess whether this was a clever marketing strategy or a programming error, I'd go for the latter. Maybe it's fixed in a firmware update.

What firmware versions apply to cars when you can or can't switch the odometer to kilometres?

[matt8]

8 minutes ago, Thackeray said:

If I had to guess whether this was a clever marketing strategy or a programming error, I'd go for the latter. Maybe it's fixed in a firmware update.

What firmware versions apply to cars when you can or can't switch the odometer to kilometres?

I have the latest firmware as updated via USB / from the latest Sat nav SD cards.

They are probably entirely separate firmwares however.

[Thackeray]

51 minutes ago, matt8 said:

I have the latest firmware

It's not impossible that it's the latest version that has the error. Unlikely but not impossible. Could you find a version number for Bruno to compare?