Cotswold Pete

A very nice car, not that I would ever own one, and the reason being although I live is a small Cotswold town, work in another Cotswold Town, it seems to me that trying to keep my car in nice condition is thwarted by other tw*ts driving into me when I am parked. Over this weekend another numpty had a go at kissing the front bumper, which from the looks of the 500, would have meant a new grille and hefty insurance claim. At least on the 400 is was a jolly good rub down with a old cloth, and later on maybe T-cut. But the chrome strip is damaged. I think I just give up making my LS look like Tip Top and just keeping it mechanically tickety-boo What is it with people who have no idea how to park without hitting all and sundry around them. This is the 8th time this has happened to me over last 25 years of living in Cotswolds, never had this problem when living in Bristol for 20 years

An LS is a car that once owned, hard to let go of. I keep meaning to try a 460, just to see if it can persuade me out of my 400, but at 202,000 miles the 400 is going strong. The only thing that bothers me is the LS range is so quite that any rattles seem to be prominent, but most 20 year old motors will have more rattles than your average materinty unit. Some twerp in a hot hatch Renault something or another was bothering me on way to work (sat in my boot they were), so a quite blip and the tank was up to 90. Nice to know it can still do it.

Having seen a Century now and again during my travels back in the late 90's and Early 2000's, not a car that appeals to me at all. My first trip in an LS was a mates Mk1 in 1993, and immediately liked the style and comfort. Not been in a Century, but the one I did get a good look at made me think it was a bit like being in my Grans back room in the 60's. The body styling (to me) seemed to be somewhere between Detroit Dustbin (I've drvien a fair few of them) and Ford Scorpio. The V12 seems quite low powered, and for pulling such a lot of metal about, the performance (surely) would be nothing like an LS with your foot down.

My current battery (only one month old) and the previous ones were Exide range, slightly underspec but previous lasted 55 months, car used every day. About the same price as Bosch. If you get an RAC battery they give 5 year guarentee, but last time they quoted me it was £120, so given Exide has 2 year guarantee, but always lasted at least 4 to 5 years for me, seems like not worth paying RAC premium. Having said that, my wife had her RAC battery fail 10 days before the end of 5yr guarantee, so result, she has a new battery, so for her worth paying the premium.

Jim, GS300 SE is a nice car, mate of mine had one for a while, it would be the car that would tempt me out of the LS400 now that I can get away with a smaller boot.

Been in GS and LS and my view is this. GS is like an LS but is more responsive on the gas at the lower revs, so feels more urgent from the lights. The LS will get there but will feel like it had to make sure its slippers were on properly before it pulls the nose up and goes. GS feels like it is going to allow you to push on through a corner with more bravado than an LS, though an LS can do corners at speeds that mean any tractor around that bend is going to be embedded in the bonnet in the next second. Never been in a GS in the wet, but I would suspect it is a little more stable. Had my LS up to 125mph and to be honest that seems like my limit, though car as stable as a rock, never been in a GS at that kind of mph. LS is quiter, though in my view not much in it on most road surfaces, though an LS versus GS on a dead new smooth surface, the LS was so much better to be in. So if ultimate agility is your thing I suspect the 460 might not quite cut it, but likely to be a close run thing. The 460 is chain drive, so assume saving £500 - £600 every 60K to 90K miles helps.

Mk3 loved the fog lights, loved not having a sat-nav (prefered the old LCD stylee), but did not like not having traction control, and did find main beam a little weak for when pushing along those country lanes at night. The Mk4 is also a little more quieter and the HID lights with self adjusting level make life a little easier and I prefer the Mk4 alloys. Mileage is no issue and mine has got me from 132,000 to 201,700 miles and apparently looks pretty okay underneath. (My Mk3 only got me from 135,000 to 192,000 before I changed, and I recall when first getting in my Mk4, that I had found my little Nivarna).

That drivers seat looks amazing even for a low mileage LS. A fair price for such a nice looking car, assuming it drives well and runnnig gear all tickety-boo

Should be fine

This is my second EB705, both went for nearly 5 years, and never had a problem in winter starting the old lady. Car gets used every day The Bosch looks like it is 306mm long where as Exide is 270mm. In that case the Bosch would be a hell of tight fit on my LS, and the it would sit on the lip of the battery tray, rather than in the well of the tray.

I find in my LS batteries last just about 5 years, and just had a new one fitted this morning. £97 fitted for Exide EB705. You can get them for around £70 looking on Internet. I just needed new one as I had cell that collapsed twice last week, and just managed to charge battery over weekend to get me to my local battery shop. Got a 3 year guarantee. I think as RAC member I could have one fitted for about £130 (with 5 year guarantee). The one thing I have learnt - having had 11 years of LS ownership is that when the alarm starts going off for no reason, it is inidcating that the battery seems to be dipping it's voltage for a short period of time and that in about 9 to 12 months the battery will throw a wobbler with a dropped cell. So in 4 years when that starts happening I shall know a new batter has to be on my shopping list. I have never had a problem with battery discharge for when I have left my car at airport for a couple of weeks, and with my Mk3, recall I could leave it for months at a time with no problems. I also recall that when I had first new battery in my Mk4, the chap reckoned my 11 year old original Toyota Battery was old school battery engineering. In the past most batteries I have had never got much beyond 5 years, but more usual 3 to 4 years.

I have a number of friends who have been involved with setting up factories in China for companies like Xerox through to small UK firms outsourcing. The story I keep hearing is that if you leave the Chinese without a Western Manager then things slowly go down hill. One example was not bothering replace metal dyes, because the parts were still looking okay (but tolerances were getting worse), this happened once HQ pulled out the shop floor managers from UK/USA. Another one was a packing production line set up to run sweet as a nut, then UK get a call three weeks later to say the machine was faulty, producing packaging not fit to use. My mate flew out and found the locals had turned up the speed button (which they had specifically been told not to fiddle with), so he reset everything, told them not to fiddle and flew home. Well 6 weeks later, they get the same call, out he flew to find (you've guessed it). The situation is no different to the type of goods we got out of Japan in the late 50s through to late 60's but the Japanese worked on quality control as an embedded part of their production model to give them a USP of quality not price. I buy a lot of made in cheap chinese electronics bits and bobs from ebay, and to be honest, its okay, but some of the stuff stops working so quickly it makes me wonder how much Chinese stuff is going into landfill having been shipped around the world. I assume once China gets too expensive for things that sort of work, then the world will move onto Vietnam, maybe Myanmar, and eventually some poor underpaid penguins in the Antartic will be knocking out car parts for 4 shrimps a week☹️

So my guess would be some electrical issue. From my experience electronics hates being to dry or way too wet, so when the humidity and tempature are just right, then failing joints on a board will not show up so much, and given your other comments, I was wondering if you have some ECU issue. It could be a loose plug somewhere that is causing ECU to get incorrect signal, or could be a problem on circuit board. Not that I would try this on Lexis, but when I have had similar problems with other electronics, I tend to flood the circuit with Servisol Switch cleaner, and if problem stops, BUT then comes back again as the cleaner dissapates (usually over a period of time) then I know I have a dry joint or some other 'dodgy' connect. On the other hand you are not getting any codes, so maybe my idea here is a false one. I cannot imagine the solenoids would be impacted much by difference in weather, but be wishing you luck and hoping your work over weekend solves problem.

Latest Lexus Donors Makes you cry to see some of those cars, but at least they are going to keep other Lexi running. Never heard of them before, but good to know about Their Blog page seems to have full lsit of models they have acquired Blog page

Just re-read the manual, and seems like I have been reading the wrong bit, and given the only thing the car carries is me the missus, and the Lexus wooden bonnet strut, and 100mph is a fantasy (though did touched 95 last night when I managed to squeeze by a Sunday driver out very early). So will drop to 30, suspect that will make the right a bit better, and see what it does to tyres. Thanks for pointing out the actual facts in the manual, and my wife will merely confirm I do not read things properly.

I am now thinking why would the LS surge forward. Even if the soleniod was sticky, surely when braking your not pushes heaps of fuel into engine, so even if it does down shift (kick down) then surely the car would have engine braking, as you have effectively starved the engine if fuel and downshifted. If you manually downshift then put pedal to the metal, do you get a different result, might give some clues as to what is not playing ball. if that works fine, then that (hopefully) rules out plugs as major part of problem.

I just had my plugs replaced, they were pretty mankey, and since then I have noticed that the foot to the floor pick up is better, though it was not as bad as you desrcibe, but I assume this means I am getting a better fuel burn so better pickup. Even with mankey plugs I was not getting rough idle, (tended to get idle hunting until I had throttle cleaned)., but maybe if you have one plug not firing right then might explain. Only other thought is fuel pump not quite right, but I would have thought that would possibly throw up some error code to do with fuel feed.

Nice little slide show, interesting to see lawyers poking their noses in with LexisNexis. As the commentary says ' shows what can be achieved with enough effort, resources and application' that about sums it up for me. I was driving around East coast USA in early 90's on luxury barges, they were really awful, and made me appreicate why I should never complain about having a Vauxhall Cavalier 1.8 GS back home, which was more luxurious (certainly underpowered), but when I tried pushing the envelope in a USA barge, ie. doing more than 65mph, I felt like I was about to lose my life on any bend on the Interstates, where as the Vaux GS would feel stable at 110mph (where it ran out of oomph).

Not my cup of tea, but I totally get why some people do this sort of thing. I do wonder what you could make a LS400 do if you engineered it to the hilt and then put it around the Nurbugring.

I assume this would work for the doors as well, as mine are looking shappby (as is my whole car)

I was given Clay Mitts as a present a couple of years ago, have never used them, but going to a wedding in two weeks, so will give the LS a proper deep wash, use hte Mitts and then wax, and hopefully it will look nice and be as smooth as a baby's backside.

Mine are Maxxi Premitra S, really not sure about them at all. I think I have going to try putting them on the back rear to see how they behave, it's almost like having them on the front it feel like I am driving with off-road tyres most of the time, and on some new road surfaces in Stroud area feels like I am driving over rumble strips, which I put down to the front tyres. Looking at the Falken ziex It seems to E rated for efficiency , but never worked out if it really makes much difference given the LS fuel consumption.

I would say that job was a lot of spit and a lot of polish. Very nice, and puts mine to shame

I run at 34psi all round. Given that is slightly above recommended 33psi, I would have expected no problems with sides. I wonder if tyres with softer walls tend to wear more, but in past with Nexen or Falken the tyres did seem to last longer than these Maxxis. I also think the Maxxis are given me a rougher ride than usual, so need to work out what is best to replace them with. Going to be ££ as all four wheels will need replacing.

Only makes sense if you have 4 tyres the same from my experience. Did do it in the past, but meant you ended up with 4 tyres with odd profiles which did not help handling. Given my rears have done over 40K, if I was rotating with fronts I would probably find rears only lasting 25K miles. So you end up throwing away more tyres when you have still got good amount of tread left across 90% width. So my take on this is, if I have change tyres, best to just replace fronts. I have noticed the off-side is also scrubbed, but not as much, so for sure will swap the fronts around. On the waste front it seems shocking to have cars not using all that rubber before it gets put into landfill. Given I do not tear-arse around roundabouts seems like tyre walls should be stiffer on outside than inside, as surely this would help, though it might increase road noise??