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New car day

I hope they don't have the Can Bus issue 😉

Actually I would blame the manufacturers for using it in applications it was never intended for, it was never designed to be a secure protocol so using it to control critical security features was a major design flaw which could and should have been foreseen.

She has been going on about it for years Len along with “bingo wings” and a “tummy tuck” It’s when I tell her you can’t improve on perfection like a Lexus that she hits me!

Apparently our plight has reached BBC Watchdog and will be shown tonight, 7pm.

Looks like the person who alerted Watchdog has set up a website to record theft cases: https://reportcanbus.com/

I am sure we will all be interested in hearing your experience of the hand over and then the driving experience- ride comfort, road noise (or absence of), performance and just general impressions. Looks good on your drive!

so your getting the last LC500 to arrive in the UK , and I have the first LC 500 to arrive in the UK, ( for customer use ) its a small world.

Admiral have the LBX in all variants on comparison websites. For a Premium Plus the quote was £602 - North Yorkshire, no accidents or claims, max NCD, retired - little competition at the moment but hopefully more insurers will now shortly list the LBX. Like "Robsmith" I am currently with LV so I’me waiting to see what their premiums are like before committing to purchase.

Thanks for clearing that up Jim.

In my experience, for what it’s worth, start with a new battery and take it from there. Problem may be gone after a new battery but, as said earlier, keep the battery on trickle charge when not in use for a while. I had a Saab 900 Turbo with starting/battery issues, charged it and car started then issue reoccurred. Local mechanic said some sort of drain on the battery and killing it and would take some investigation. Took the car to an auto electrician, he checked ‘things’ and said battery is knackered, didn’t take him long either. Fitted new battery and problem gone. Ever since then, any signs of bad/lazy starting or flat battery in a morning……..new battery fitted and all ok again.

The UXe is a lovely car and we have no regrets with it, but it is not an efficient EV. The range displayed is arbitrary rather than a reflection of previous journeys. To know your real range you have to divide the number of miles covered between charges, for battery percentage used. You can only see the percentage in the app, nowhere in the car (bonkers). My wife is getting a theoretical max of about 115-120 miles at the minute with the heating on. If you have the above info you can calculate your efficiency. Number of miles travelled divided by percentage used. Multiply that number by 100 = real range on a full charge. Divide that real range by 45 (usable battery size) = miles per kWh efficiency. My wife is getting 2.6 - 2.7. As a comparison, our Soul EV would be doing close to 4. We would be getting 120-125 miles around now, so slightly better range with only 30kWh of usable battery. All of that said leccy is cheap at night and the Lexus is a much nicer car. Just a shame they are so behind the curve with full EV’s.

Yeah, the two opposing surfaces (aluminium & steel) bond together pretty good over time. I got a garage to replace mine. First one went in 2021, then the other side lasted until 2023.

Did you try Admiral? I got a quote yesterday evening through “comparethemarket “ of £602. See previous post.

Hi Guys Just brought a new UX250h , Only found out when I picked it up from the dealers that it had run-flat tyres, after 500 bone-shaking and noisy miles I have now ha the run-flats removed and ordinary tyres fitted and what a difference its made I now have a quiet and soft ride ,something I would expect from a Lexus---what a shame I had to spend over £500 to correct a design mistake (dealer was not interested my problem)

What's it got to do with the dealer? If you had actually read the specs for your UX model before laying out a fair wedge buying it you would have seen it came with run flats.

Once it has been flattened, your battery is damaged, and the more times it goes flat, the more damage is caused. You will almost certainly need a new battery. Don't leave your car unused for more than a couple of weeks without plugging in a battery maintainer. These cars use a little power even when switched off, and the battery will also self-discharge over a few months, so you need to keep the battery charged if not using it even semi-regularly or only doing short runs. I use a cheap £20 7Amp (90W) maintainer that is plugged in in the garage. I just extended the 12v cables to reach where I park the car and fitted a good quality plug and socket to make it easy to plug in & unplug. If you cannot do that, then you can get solar powered chargers that will do the job. Anything over 10W will do the job but 20W is better. Ideally put the solar cell inside the window that gets direct sunlight (south facing). They even work on cloudy days, just less efficiently. I wired one into a friends car with a simple plug so when he parks the car he just puts the panel in the windscreen and plugs it in.

Nope, the only way to manually start a cleaning cycle is via TechStream. Usually you can tell when a DPF cleaning is running as lots of smoke comes out the back!

We will need photos!!

The over optimistic figures quoted by car manufacturers to give the Would Like To Predict (WLTP) figures are no different to the MPG figures quoted. E.g the quoted MPG figure of an IS300h is 64.2 mpg and a fuel tank size of 66 litres giving a range of 932 miles. The average MPG figure when I had my IS was 44.8 MPG, giving a range of 650 miles. A 30% reduction in range. So not much different for the EV perceived drop in range. This too is affected by cold temperatures and poor weather. However I did travel 15 miles yesterday and only lost 15 miles in range. On a full charge (100%) I am getting a dash range of 165 miles with aircon on (UX300e).

Did the existing battery come with a warranty maybe ? I bought my last ( August just past ) new Yuasa battery 5 yr warranty from GSF motor factors at £166 ...... the previous Yuasa one it replaced on my 91 Ls400 had been there about 8 years Maybe get them or someone to test the old battery ......... new one is Yuasa 335/5000 100Ah 830cca best to order on-line to collect in store, it's less expensive than buying over that same counter for some weird reason 🙃 But only if you're going to buy a new one of course ........... Good luck Malc

Sounds as though one of the plates within the battery could be at fault .....maybe at one stage the battery went flat and putting a load on it (starting up current draw) buckled a plate or two thus causing your issue.

Get yourself a cheap multimeter to definitively find out whether or not the battery is dead in the future. They are less than a tenner and will show you the actual voltage you're getting at the battery terminals. You could also look into getting a car battery tester, I bought a JDiag BT300 for about £35 from Amazon. This will give you an indication of battery capacity.

Mines now due in the dealership tomorrow, or Friday.......maybe.

But sadly, like with home networking and "smart" devices, security was an afterthought. The original design (back in the 1980s) was for convenience and connectivity without thinking about the "what ifs" of some nefarious person or device being connected and what could go wrong. Stable door, bolt and horse spring to mind! Cars being stolen in under 1 minute, strangers being able to view baby monitors, control your boiler / HVAC and more unintended consequences follow.

The Yokohama tyres that were fitted as OEM to my IS 300h were BluEarth E51A and I have replaced them with the same over the life of the car - they have a wheel rim protection built into the tyre (some rubber that sits slightly proud of the wheel rim to minimise kerbing damage). They are always in stock at my local Lexus dealer and I have always gone there for all of my tyres on this car. The BluEarth E51A are £110.17 fitted from Black Circles: https://www.blackcircles.com/catalogue/yokohama/bluearth-e51a/225/45/R17/W/91/f?tyre=32829507 - I think you were may have been looking at different Yokohama tyre at £86 each. However, In December last year I paid £80 per tyre for the BluEarth E51A (all in incl. vat, fitting, balancing etc.) at my local Lexus dealer. I think I mentioned before (and others on the forum have too) that Lexus dealers (at least some of them) will beat other tyre places on price so worth asking them for a price. Of course, tyre choice is very subjective and each of us has our own requirements. For me, given my 15K miles per annum, much of it motorway miles, I am happy fitting the OEM tyres at the price I get them for from my local Lexus dealer, and mileage-wise I always get 20K miles from the rears and 40K miles from the fronts.

Sounds cheap if you consider the price of a new floppy luggage cover! 😬

Yes they do have a strong defence nowadays, very true and absolutely necessary. I have a couple of funny, or not so funny stories - in brief: I went to a very large bank HQ for an appointment with their head of IT. I walked in the building and the security guard was busy with someone else so I passed by someone coming out who held the door open for me! I walked up to the server room where his office was. He was not in his office. He was in the bullet-proof air-conditioned glass square construction that held the main servers. I tapped on the glass and someone let me in. I stood next to the IT chief until he spotted me. You should have seen his face. He could not believe how anyone could get in. I know it was cheeky of me but I could not resist the experiment. Crazy times! Second true story: Big manufacturing company had a ransomware attack and rightly refused to pay. Worst case scenario is lose a full day's transactions ( which had an audit trail on a separate network isolated server system anyway ) and back up from a "Ghost" image and re-instate all the data from the daily back-up. The daily back-up was a series of physical tapes which were recorded and saved in rotation every night starting at 6pm. This boring repetitive task was given to a junior member of the IT team. They were very disappointed when the non-existant back-up was found on an empty tape. It had never backed up and was never tested. He just did not understand why he got an error message and thought it was just an information pop-up. Thankfully we have better ways of doing things now.🤭.

Congratulations! 1) Hard to say without hearing the sound but i think it could be the brake actuator. The brakes on a hybrid are very different to normal cars and is completely computer controlled. When you apply the brakes the computer decides whether to use hydraulics or re-gen braking depending on the situation. There is a pump that pressurises the hydraulics and keeps it ready for the next time you press the pedal. You normally hear this pump when you open the drivers door before setting off and also when you park. It does pump during driving as well but less audible due to other noises. 2) This only works when conditions are right i.e your engine needs to be warm, your battery must have sufficient charge your climate control must not demand heat etc. Even then you can only use for speeds up to 30 mph or something and the range it offers is just around a mile or so on these older hybrids so pretty useless. There is this YouTube channel called car care nut. He does a series where he explains all different aspects of a Toyota hybrid might be worth watching the videos on there to get an understanding of the peculiarities of a hybrid

I saw Michelin has a new primacy 4 range that's both A for fuel and A for rain, plus very low road noise. They're the "bmw approved" so I guess they're also developed for real wheel drive and I think those are the ones I will be fitting when the moment comes.

No, Apple CarPlay and Android Auto capability became standard for MY20 models but it was also made available as an upgrade for the earlier MY19 launch vehicles. At the time is was around £100 for the upgrade.

Well done! My 2014 model is now approaching 80k, and looking at the negligible deterioration over the last 20,000 miles I'm sure it will be just as good at 100k. What model did you get? Just wondering whether you got air suspension or not. In response to your questions: 1. Is the AC on or not? If you're in "Ready" that makes noises even if the petrol engine is not running. 2. Ignore the EV button, let it do its own thing. If you try and use it when it's cold it won't let you, and you'll soon pick up when it kicks in. A bit of a lift or coasting is all it takes much of the time.

Mmmm… 😀 And I’m betting she doesn’t read your contributions to this website, Steve! 😡👊

My UX is insured with LV. LV couldn't quote for an LBX when I spoke to them last week.

I ordered the only LC500 Ultimate Edition Coupe a couple of weeks ago which was already in the UK in their depot. Waiting to collect in the next few days. Dealership told me that this is the last coupe that arrived in the UK and production has stopped. I was mostly looking for the panoramic 360 camera and trouchscreen is the bonus.

Other than JBL, you can also have a look on Rockford, Focal, Pioneer or Kicker. They have some good 3.5" too. IMHO, if you only aim to replace those 2 front speaker, anything under $100 will gives you a big improvement. You dont need those expensive ones as you got road and tyre noise while driving anyway.

Very much so.... Classic 5 spoke ( or in this case 5 double-spokes) never goes out of style id say

Slightly more concerning if it wasn’t the Lexus it might have been the horse in the background 😮

That what was said, last week. 😞

I used this on mine, works a treat. Fairly straight forward to install with a few tools and gentle hands.

Well I decided to go with stanwithaplan and buy the halfords car cover option as my driveway is tarmac and I don't know what is underneath it so bolting anything down may not be possible anyway. Size XL and 10% discount ended yesterday so I payed £60. When I get the car back from paint I'll make sure it's completely dry if it has rained and regularly air it when we get a dry day to try to avoid condensation. Thanks for all the helpful information guys.

My NX has been left in the garage for about 3 and a half weeks and "started" all OK yesterday. Hope this helps. I would prefer not to use a trickle charger.

Bus is a computing term meaning a shared communication path between components, essentially via copper wires either within a system or allowing multiple systems to communicate with each other. CAN is an acronym for controller area network (hence why it is written in capital letters) - it is the specific protocol, or language, that is sent over the bus - like humans, two items communicating need a common language to understand each other. Within the auto industry there are many different protocols used. Toyota/Lexus commonly use CAN, LIN, AVC-LAN and MOST. The reason for using buses rather than discrete wiring is to save cost and allow more sophisticated features. Take the rear light clusters, (Toyota don't typically use CAN for rear lights but just as an example) - traditionally you have multiple wires, one for each function: rear light, brake, left indicator, right indicator, reverse and fog. That's 6 controls wires + ground. If you had sequential indicators you need two more wires for sequential mode rather than standard on/off required for hazard, so a total of 9 wires. If you had CAN controlled light clusters you can reduce to just 4 - +12v, ground and two CAN wires. If you want your mirrors to drop when in reverse, rather than a signal wire going to the mirror ECU, it can just listen for the reverse communication without needing any additional wires. If you take it to the extreme, where modern matrix headlights are made up of 1,000+ individual LEDs that each can be controlled individually to block out the beam to oncoming traffic then that wouldn't be economically possible or reliable using discrete wiring.

The problem is they likely have algorithm driven criteria for assessing ads. The things that alert us mean nothing to those algorithms. For example, you have the same SC 430 ad posted in about 4 or 5 different locations within the UK. Same price, same reg etc. However, when you report it they come back and report they are not going to cancel the ad as it does not breach their criteria. In that case all you can do is block the profile ( which means little as the scammers obviously have has many different profiles as they want), and of course hide the ad., but it will keep popping up under it's many aliases. Facebook probably will not get serious about scammers until someone decides that by law they are liable for any fraudulent losses incurred via their platform. Nothing motivates like seeing your bottomline diminishing.

Yes of course, apologies. Using the jump points in the engine bay means you don’t have to get the boot open if the battery is located there.

The battery is not under the bonnet (it's in the boot). However, the jump start points ARE under the bonnet - see pages 727 & 728 of the user manual.

It was mentioned in there, and Toyota gave this reassuring message to existing owners: A spokesperson for Toyota, which owns Lexus, said: “Toyota and Lexus are continuously working on developing technical solutions to make vehicles more secure. Since introducing enhanced security hardware on the latest versions of a number of models, we have seen a significant drop-off in thefts. For older models we are currently developing solutions.”

So the questions for me now are: Do the criminals know that the pre-facelift NX is not an easy target? and will the insurance companies fix their premiums accordingly? It would be interesting to hear from owners of pre-facelift NXs on this forum.

That's my understanding too Ken. I read that this is because Lexus implemented Toyota Security Key (TSK) a unique encrypted key which the ECU's require before executing any CAN commands. This means that the physical key has to be present. However we don't know when or if the criminal fraternity will overcome it. It doesn't stop the scum doing damage to the wheel arch and bumper finding out though.

As NX owners you *really* need to hassle Lexus Customer Services, your local dealer and Lexus via any social media means possible - you need a metal plate solution just as much as me (LC) and the remaining RX owners. I have a Tracker, Immobiliser, Smart water and other entertaining things on my car but the problem is the bumper would be ripped off before the thieves realised. Annoying!!