Carl911

I have owned my GS450H for just over three months now. I had considered buying a brand new is300h but saw the GS by pure luck whilst visiting the Lexus main dealer and ended up buying it. Firstly I must say that the car drives superb, like a new car in fact. However, since owning up it has spent a few trips to the Lexus main dealer. Firstly the climate system started to play up in that air would only come out of certain vents. Not the end of the world but Lexus replaced the unit under warranty at a cost of a eye watering £1500. My wipers were also very squeaky so Lexus kindly replaced those to. Now I have had a strange buzzing noise which has always annoyed me. It does it from cold start and then at certain revs when the engine is running. I might add you can only hear it with the window open but it's always bothered me anyway. I thought it sounded like a resonating exhaust box or heat shield. Lexus said it was a common fault and was caused by the fuel pump. Dubious I was but hey, Lexus warranty fitted a new one costing around £500. Unfortunately this did not cure the issue. Anyway, I had the car serviced and whilst doing there checks they noticed a slightly leaky shock, an oil leak from the vvc high pressure pipe and a slight leak from the water pump. Rather surprised I was as the car has only done 50,000 miles but then it is still 8 years old. Oh well, Lexus warranty replaced everything at a cost to them of £1200. Still rather perplexed at my ongoing buzz I asked Lexus to take another look. After removing the exhaust and heat shield it was confirmed that the buzz was in fact a slightly noisy rear box baffle. Kindly, Lexus have agreed to replace the rear exhaust system at a cost to them of £1500. Thank you Lexus. To be fair, if it were my money, most of the issues with the exception of maybe the oil pipe could have been left with no real detriment to the car itself. However, I think it certainly proves just how Astonishingly good the Lexus extended warranty is. Even at £995 for two years cover its easy to see how just a few parts with labour can benefit your wallet in the long term. All that aside, the car has driven impeccably and has been a joy to drive and the warranty has certainly proved very useful. Carl

I'm sure you will be fine. Like all cars, if it's got a good service history that's half the battle.I owned one for 4 years and it never missed a beat to almost the day I sold it and then had to have the dpf cleaned and a new injector fitted. Think that was just unfortunate. Even then, over four years that was pretty cheap maintenance. The key is to make sure these cars get a good run and by the sounds of it you are doing motorway miles. Despite the cars often bad rep on here, I liked my is220d, it was a smooth diesel to drive and drove lovely on the motorway leaving me feeling relaxed at the end of my journey. It did have an unusual 6 speed box but once you got used to it I never had a problem. Only reason I sold mine was because I changed jobs and only had a short 8 mile commute to work and that for any diesel is not good. you have bought it now so just enjoy and don't worry too much about the negatives. I never really did and mine never let me down. Carl

I thought it was a long shot, just see the same car every morning, looks a nice clean ls400 I think, must look more closely. Cheers on the photos, I went through a phase a few years ago where I just wanted to take photos, in particular, landscape and some portrait. For some reason I just got bored and haven't done it since. I'm sure if I travelled somewhere interesting it could spark my interest off again. Carl

I pass most mornings an LS on my way to work, sometimes parked up, sometimes returning home. Wondered if it belonged to anyone on here?

To be honest, that's what I thought but they are supposed to be the experts. I'm waiting to see what they say as they were trying to get a new pump on warranty. I still thought it sounded like a buzzing heat shield as has been mentioned. Maybe I'll take it somewhere else for a se I don't opinion. Carl

I have had a buzzing noise on my car since I bought it three months ago and hadn't payed it much attention as it isn't really audible unless the window is down. Now the better weather is here I have found it to be quite annoying, The buzz sounds like a buzzing Heat guard or similar metal guard. It does it from stone cold morning start when the engine revs slightly higher for the first 30sevonds. You then hear it under light acceleration from between 5-30mph where assuredly the engine hits a certain Rev. I took it into Lexus and they tell me this is common fault and is the fuel pump on the fuel tank that causes this. Apparently the only possible cure is to replace the pump and even then it doesn't always cure it. This sounds a bit odd to me and I'm pretty sure most Lexus drivers would find the constant buzzing in acceptable. Does anyone else eith a 450h have this same issue or know of it. Carl

What michelins did you fit, I hAve Dunlop all round and thought they were one of the quietist tyres out. Carl

i don't like to put one Lexus against another As they all have there pros and cons but I think my main quibble was I expexctrd it to be much quieter than my GS. Ultimately though, my GS is an extremely quiet car and as mentioned, the differences at this level start to become slighter. It's interesting you mention your ceiling mounted TV. The rep. that went out with me said he had had a few customers drop orders as they didn't like the new position of the TV screen in the new models as apparently they are mounted between the fronts seats now. Many argued it restricted the cars use of interior space, so again these things are always personal preference. For me I am happy with my GS in almost every respect but if I could improve it it would be to add throes extra gadgets even though I don't really need them, just because you can. Carl

Thanks CARL.......................and you have not even mentioned the relative difficulty of parking the LS ?Regards John Lol, yes this is also true, I didn't want to sound like I m knocking the LS any more than necessary and perhaps compared to something like a BMW the compare would have been considerably different. It's fair to say it has given me renewed faith in my GS450H and a lot more respect for the quality that it really is. Carl

Ok, so I have always like the idea of the top dog LS but deep down felt it a bit impractical for my commute. That said, I have always wondered how the LS compares to my GS. Well I took out a LS460 for a test drive to decide. I was hoping to be blown away by the vast improvement in refined and quiet ride. I'm certainly not knocking the LS as it is indeed a wonderful car but comparing it against my GS the differences are frankly Smaller than I expected. Road noise was possibly a tiny bit better but not enough to make any real difference. In both cars I can chat to my son sat in the back without raising my voice at 60mph. I would have to measure the difference in decibels with a device as my ears couldn't detect a vast difference. In fact I found the LS suffered from quite a lot of wind noise which seem to come from the wing mirrors. In the GS, this is not noticeable at all. The engine note was about the same level as my GS albeit in the LS the gearbox changed gear as apposed to the single gear feel of the CVT. maybe I have got used to the CVT now but I found the gearbox on the LS could have been a lot smoother changing. If anything my IS250 seems to change smoother. Power wise the engine was responsive particularly when kicked down although I felt my GS pull quicker and stronger for the most part. I really wanted to love the LS and be convinced that it was indeed the next car for me but to be honest other than the additional gadgets most of which reside in the rear I just could t justify the change. I got back in my GS afterwards and took the same journey just to compare in my own head and I felt in many ways the GS was equally as good in almost every respect. Given the better fuel economy and price to buy a GS vs a LS I really have to say I come away knowing that the GS was the right car for me. I think that it has helped me decide that the next car would have to be the newer shape GS. CARL

Yes, I definitely glad for the warranty, the heater that went wrong last month was best part of £1500 to correct and the mentioned points this month around £1200 so getting on for £3000 in less than three months. Makes the £995 for two years warranty seem quite reasonable. Carl

Just had my 70,000 mile service at Lexus. Car has only just done 57,000 but I guess it's the years rather than the mileage. Anyway, they email me a little video showing some advisories. It appears I have a leaky front shock, bad oil leak in engine from vvti high pressure oil pipe, whatever that is and also the water pump is leaking. Must say I wasn't expecting so many leaks from what I still see as a fairly low mileage car. Anyway, on the bright side all is covered under my Lexus extended warranty I had when I bought the car so happy days. Would of lightened my pocket £1200 otherwise. Carl

Was the weather for cleaning yesterday. I spent several hours washing and polishing the is250 and gs450h and both come up looking lovely. I often think it's hard to tell any difference on silver, that is unless you polish one panel and compare the two. It brings out the metallic flec. All that said, looked out the window this morning to see a bird has bombed the centre of the bonnet so guess what my first job of the morning is? Carl

Probably stating the obvious but have you tried other dvd's and I presume it's a region 2 dvd and not American region 1's. Once the system recognises its a dvd if will show as dvd in the disc list. Carl

Agreed, it's an excellent unit. Tne thing I want to sort next is formatting a usb stick with several partitions so that the vais unit sees 6 discs which I can set up as different music formats ect.I did find that when I added music to my usb to existing music the unit never recognised it at first. I then formatted it and re-added again and all worked fine. I need to get my head around that area but otherwise as good as having a CD player. Only real annoyance is the lexus screen that greys out useful features as soon as you drive off such as file lists ect. I'm still contemplating doing the fix to allow me to use these functions on the move even though I don't really like playing with wires. Carl

I'm not a professional Valeter but as I understand it you need to use clean clay each time to avoid scratching the paint with contaminants already in the clay. That said, the idea as I understand is to keep folding the clay to a clean area to Re-use. I guess this will depend on how contaminated the clays be ones as to how many times you can re-use it. Someone with more knowledge will probably correct me but that's how I understood it anyway. Carl

I do t know what Vais is fitted in that video but I only had to remove one cable which was white one also shown in the video. It was not be necessary to unplug any others as shown n the vid. Aldo the screen layout looks totally different on that car. Maybe its different on the face lift models.I covered my gear stick with a small pillow when I did mine as I didn't want to risk damaging or scratching anything. I would recommend using plastic pry tools or at very least taping the end of the screw driver. Carl

I didn't attach any other wires other than the plug that came with it that went directly into the back of the head unit. I have had no problems since installing mine.

I have to say my car only smoked slightly and I only ever saw it once after it returned from lexus after doing some recall work. They said its possibly some excess oil that burnt of after the work they did caused it. I dont exactly know how this could occur after replacing the fuel pipes ect but it hasn't done it since and I periodically do check. I have just had the dadh out and had new clips and felt added so I'm hoping this will cure the dreaded creak. So far I haven't heard it which is a good sign. Fingers crossed.

I fitted a vaistech to my gs450h. The setup is much the same in the ls. Simple plug and play setup, no wire cutting. Only work is removing a few trim panels and stereo to get to the plug at the back. You can plug in your iPhone or use a usb stick. Everything is controlled through your normal car media controls, eg steering wheel as you would the cd. Sound quality is excellent and as yet not had any problems. I posted a few pics and details in the Gs threads. http://www.vaistech.com/site/mml.php Carl

As mentioned, I fitted mine a few weeks ago and it works superb. Dead easy to fit and works just like the built in CD player. If you need any more information on the unit or fitting or pictures I'm happy to help. Regarding orders being from the states, my experience, stuff gets delivered quicker from the states than from the uk most of the time. You will need to factor in the £25 import duty but other than that no problems. Carl

I have also tried most tyre brands and found the Dunlop to be one of the quieter tyres plus decent grip. I use dunlops on both my is250 and gs450h. Carl

Hi, that's quite a big step up in power from the is220. I also had an is220 a little while back. Sure you will enjoy the gs450h. I bought mine about 2 months ago and have no regrets yet. I have had a few little niggles like squeaks in the dash and had the heater climate control play up but all covered by my warranty so not too fussed. Have fun and let us know how you find the car once you have had more time to drive it in all conditions. Carl

Agreed, let's face it, most people do use there cars to get from A TO B, which sounds boring but is the reality. That usually entails being stuck in lots of traffic and driving on potholed roads so yes, how good your car is probably depends on how it keeps you calm and relaxed in these situations. The Lexus with its smooth auto box and relaxing ride certainly covers all the really important bases. Carl

I owned a BMW 320 petrol , 320d & 330d.. The 320petrol was thirstier than the Lexus is250 and no comparison to the Lexus ride quality, the 320d averaged around 43mpg and the 330d around 30mpg. My is 250 averages around 27-31mpg mainly town driving. I have a gs450h which averages around 25-30mpg also mainly town driving. I think the is250 for a v6 is a very economic engine. You have to put things into perspective, a BMW 318 for instance will probably see you in the mid 30mpg but it's such a dull car inside and out. I got rid of my Bmw's because I was sick of the image and also I found the interiors in particular to be very boring and lacking in creature comforts. Everybody has Bmw's or audi's. I genuinely feel good to drive something less common on the road and the Lexus badge holds a certain status which I feel proud to own.