matt-c

I was going to suggest giving the throttle a clean. With all you've said you've done, only thing I can suggest is giving the ECU a reset (someone correct me if I'm wrong, but you just need to unplug the battery cable, leave it for 10 mins / half an hour or so, then reconnect and start it up, and put about 20 mins driving time on it)

Having seen pics of what can be done with fine wet and dry sanding and G2/3 gel, they can look brand spanking new. But just bear in mind that once sanded, they will cloud and dull much quicker, and need doing much more often. I tried t-cut with mine, and it didn't do anything other than add a little shine. The pitting and light scratches weren't affected, and are still there.

It's easy - I swapped mine over last night in the dark and took 5 mins. For the passenger side, which is tight, just twist outtue side light and indicator bulb first - gives that little bit more room to get to the headlight bulb. Fit headlight, then indicator and side light

Being a 2001, it didn't come with HIDs as standard, and it's highly unlikely that it has the factory HID headlights from the IS300 or late (04/05) IS200. It's much much more likely that it has had a conversion, and going on the info you've given, I'd say it has. Although as Pete Shawn says, pictures would help confirm. Anyway, as Petayv8 says, you don't need a full kit, just the bulbs, as is the information about what bulbs. You want 9006 (HB4) fitment bulbs - no BiXenon or dual filament bulbs. The seller he linked to is one I just purchased a set of bulbs from myself (my kit should have had 5000k bulbs, but they were too blue for my liking, and we think they were either 6000k or possibly 8000k, so I changed them for 5000k). 5000k are supposed to be white, however I'm finding out that it depends where you buy from and probably how much you spend, but also that I've read if you have 55w ballasts, 5000k bulbs are white, but on 35w ballasts they have a little blue in them, so you may want to go for 4300k (which, and I'm guessing a bit here) might appear a little yellow on 35w, but more white on 55w) You might as well replace both bulbs in yours at the same time - 1) because most come in pairs, and 2) because of the colour match. Then just keep the left over one you have as a spare in case one dies on you, to keep you going till you buy another pair.

Yeah it's hard to get accurate pics, specially with only a phone camera and less than perfect conditions. A pic I should have taken was holding a white box up 10 inches or so from each headlight - the old one you could see the blue tinge, and the new one was white. Seller is this guy; http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/200710535739?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1497.l2649 I'll run them for a bit, and hopefully they'll bed in a plain brilliant white. If that's still not right I'll give 43k a try I guess. But at the mo, with the limited use they've had, I'm happier with the new ones than the old ones. Just need to take the car out on a run up some country lanes to see!

I originally ordered 5k, which I was under the impression would be pure white (no blue). Mine certainly had blue, and to me looked more like other people's 6k (much like yours) I ordered another set of 5k (bulbs only) yesterday, which to my surprise arrived today (benefit of dealing with a UK seller I guess!), and these are the pics as fitted (really not very good, I'll get some better ones soon) These are the first "5k" bulbs And this is with the new 5K in the left, old 5K in the right (as we look at it), and their beam Will give these a bit to set in, then get some better pics and report back

Nice conversion. My question is; how do you change the bulb? Unless I'm missing something, and I probably am, there's no way to access the bulb from the back of the headlight, so you'd need to split the headlight open again,remove the projector, disassemble the projector to change the bulb?

That's kinda why I don't like mine - they look a bit chavvy, and scream "aftermarket!", even though they are (I just don't want them to look it) Nice white light with plenty of spread and I'll be happy

I've been speaking to a uk seller about it - showed him my pics and he reckons mine are more like 8k, so I've ordered a set of 5k's from him, which he assures are brilliant white, not blue. So when they arrive I'll bung em in and see what the difference is! To be updated.........

Can't say anything about canbus systems. Might help if you explain what the problems are you're having though? As for colour, I'm still not convinced on mine. Granted these are iPhone pics, but you get the idea. They aren't the "white" white I thought they'd be, and more a blue white; Chris - any chance of some pics of yours in the dark? Also that link?

Now that does look like promising news! Thanks for posting that - I gave up on twitter years ago, so I'd have missed that!

Getting wider tyres for winter is completely counter intuitive. You should be going narrower, not wider, as Steve says

I can see that because you aren't getting the answers you want, you aren't prepared to have a sensible and intelligent discussion. But one last time I'll play along and address your points. 1. No, but I have seen it several times, as previously stated, so yes I do understand. 2. Several times you have said the "used approved" is worth nothing, and in your 2nd to last post made a reference to "Del Boy's Trading". If you insisting the "used approved" is a con, you need to word it better - anyone would read what you've written as likening Lexus, in this case, to conning you. You even just wrote "used approved" is a myth - meaning its a con. 3. Correct. Lexus do not cover tyre blow outs, and that is because they cannot physically check them, or predict what they will do with 100% certainty. Now, as I've explained many times, Lexus also cannot physically inspect the firmest of a windscreen either, so how could they say with any certainty that is is or is not safe? You already know this - firstly I've told you several times, and secondly Autoglass had to undertake the work. Not because Lexus didn't want to, but because it's a specialist field, and not something Lexus can do. You go on to say you had no fair or integrity in the tyres - did you change them then? I wouldn't drive my family around if I had no faith or integrity in the tyres. Or did you mean you had no reason to doubt the integrity of the tyres? Because you also had no reason to doubt the integrity of the windscreen former either - at least not until AFTER you had a problem with it. Likewise, Lexus would have had no reason to doubt the windscreen had been fitted incorrectly either - their trust was placed into the fitter that fitted it. Just as my customers put faith into me doing a good job everyday. Also the use of flexitrim is not a clear indication the screen has been fitted badly. The trim is just a trim, and what trim is used does not correlate directly to whether the screen has been put in with or without primer. You could put a screen in with no trim at all, but that doesn't mean you wouldn't have cleaned prepped and primed the screen and aperture correctly. Likewise you can out a dealer supplied screen in, with a dealer supplied trim, but that's not clear proof that the screen had been cleaned prepped and primes correctly. That all I have to say on it now, as I'm just repeating myself. You're clearly not willing to have mature discussion, and I don't need to have anything poked at me, or have it appear that I am being attacked. I'm impartial, apart from the fact I have a far more educated and experienced insight into to it than you. But I feel my words are wasted, so that's where I'm going to leave it. Good luck

I understand your frustration - id probably e as frustrated as you. However asking a company to do something try actually can't, and then declaring them con artists because of it is a bit much. What if you bought the car and a tyre blew out? Is it Lexus' fault, even tho the tyres are made by Dunlop? Lexus can only visually check the tyres (just as try can only visually check the windscreen), but if there is no visible damage to the tyre, and nothing to suggest it will fail, would you still hold them liable for it failing a year after purchasing it?

I'm sorry, we're not following each other. I know all about the connector, and the chip (it can be copied, and has been copied, including the chip inside it). I don't want to connect the phone by Bluetooth, as I've already stated. Going back to my original question, I'm looking to know if anyone has a grom, and has an iPhone 5, and has tried it with the adapter to see if it works. That's all.

Trust me, if they were the be all and end all, we'd have been using them long ago. As I said, they only way to tell for sure, is to physically remove the screen, or compromise it in such a way it would need replacing anyway. I've worked for the biggest names in automotive glazing; companies that have VERY deep pockets, and very good R&D departments. And time and time again, gizmo's have been proven unreliable, or plain useless. We had some very expensive kit for detecting and pin-pointing water ingress around windscreens. Only trouble was the cars it found it on, most of the time, weren't leakers and didn't need the screens replacing, and cars that did, it reported as clean. Useful!

Problem is, pressure testing a screen, even to airbag level, is like crack testing a bicycle helmet - once you've done it, you're gonna want to change the screen anyway! There's a massively high chance the screen will crack anyway, but even if it doesn't, you're going to be driving around thinking that all the components (glue etc) have been subjected to forces they don't usually get subjected to, even though they are designed to withstand, and will then be thinking that you should now get it changed so nothing is stressed - in the event of an accident and your airbags go off and the screen is ripped out, you'll be thinking "would that have happened if it hadn't been tested, and thus subjected to higher than normal stresses, before I bought it. The legal ramifications of that could be crippling, so no company will do it. But as said, being able to lift a screen out, that should have been bonded in, is a very isolated situation. I've come across it twice in 8 years (and god knows how many thousands of screens I've changed) - one was a Renault Clio, and was the one that lifted out, and the other was an Escort that wasn't quite as bad, as the glue was holding it in three corners. But the top, both sides and bottom were not bonded securely. One other was an old Merc (190E) that was boned in all the way round, except the bond on the bottom hadn't adhered properly. I had to cut the top and sides, but the bottom lifted out. Partial non-adhesion isn't THAT uncommon, but still vastly outweighed by complete adhesion, with complete no adhesion being a very very tiny % of screens fitted.

As a windscreen fitter of 8 years, and having done loads of work for dealerships, I can tell you it is an isolated incident. There is no way a dealership can quality control what another company does - if they could they would do the windscreen fitting themselves. The problem here, which I've seen before, is down to the individual fitter that did the job, not the dealership. The problem arises though that the customer thinks the problem lies with the dealership, when in fact it lies with the windscreen fitting company, and the next problem is that the customer doesn't have a "contract" with the windscreen company - the dealership does (the dealership will have a warranty supplied to them by the fitter, unless they've foolishly "done it on the cheap" and paid for a cash job with no comebacks - unlikely, but wouldn't be the first time I've seen it) So, what needs to be done is a reputable windscreen company diagnoses and qualifies the problem, with proof, then the dealership takes it up with the company they had do the work. In regard to trims, it's something I hear time and time again. Very VERY few cars ever receive a dealer part trim when having a windscreen replacement. They are nearly always pattern part trims, and most of the time indistinguishable from a dealer part trim. Of course, this is different to a "flexitrim" - flextrim is just universal trim off the roll. Sometimes it's entirely necessary to use this type of trim (for example, an Austin Maestro has one of the worst fitting trims ever, but spend a bit of time with universal trim and mitre the corners you get a perfect fit that looks ten times better than the standard trim. Likewise, the Ford Galaxy / Seat Alhambra / VW Sharan has a top trim that usually looks rubbish - flexitrim looks much much better, and fits on the glass nicer) and it's also needed on older cars that trims aren't available on anymore. I personally wouldn't, and haven't needed to, use universal or flexitrim on an Lexus or Toyota in the past, so unless the fitter didn't have a trim available at time of fitting for whatever reason, it should have had one. On the topic of safety, I've fitted screens to cars before that haven't had any primer at all applied to any point of the car or screen, and a couple of those I've been able to literally lift the screen out of them without needing to cut them out. THOSE screens are scary. But those are extreme, and rare cases, where there's been no primer used at all, and the surface hasn't been cleaned properly - a number of factors that all contribute to a severely dangerously "fitted" screen. But they are few and far between. The glue we use in the trade is always evolving, and it's pretty good stuff, even without primer. Again, personally, I wouldn't fit a screen without primering it first, but provided the surface has been cleaned well enough, and the aperture in the car is clean, there will usually be enough adhesion to be "safe enough". Granted, this isn't much consolation to the OP, and I'd be as furious as he is; it is true the screen counts as much as up to 30% in some cars (it's not an automatic 30% for all cars, bear in mind), but I have seen screens fitted that have been in cars for years without primer and they've still been fine. As for Lexus, or any other manufacturer/dealership "testing" the quality of windscreen fitting into used cars they sell, it's nigh on impossible for them to do so - as said, if they had the means to, then they would be doing the replacements themselves. They have to rely on the integrity and professionalism of the company they have do the work for them. The only thing they can test is if it leaks or not. If it doesn't, there is no visual clues they can see to suggest it has or hasn't been fitted correctly. If it does then they should indeed have a different company undertake removing it, finding out why, and replacing it correctly. It's the same as if you have a gas engineer come and work on your boiler. You know nothing about boilers, so you cannot possibly comment on whether the work has been done properly. Maybe if you take the front panel off and find the wires have all been cut and joined with sellotape and sticky gum, then maybe you can see something is up, but you don't have the experience to give a qualified diagnosis. Even as a windscreen fitter, there can be a number of things that can be "wrong" with a windscreen that are impossible to see/discover without actually removing the screen completely - and even then it can be hard to spot the actual culprit. Back to resolving the issue, if the screen was replaced before Lexus took "ownership" of the vehicle, there is really nothing they can do about it. Autoglass give the longest warranties for their fitting; they give a lifetime warranty on all fitted glass (and on stone chip repairs too). However, the warranty only applies to the person who owns it at the time - as soon as the car is sold the warranty ceases. If Lexus had the work done, the warranty would cease when the OP bought the car. I've seen it time and time before - one poor woman ended up having to pay me, when I worked at Autoglass, £422 for a new screen in her 307 she bought used from a Peugeot dealership after it leaked. I did my absolute best to save the screen she had in it, in the hope I could reuse it, but it cracked coming out. Because the screen was fitted prior to the dealer taking the car in, they don't have a warranty on it, the original owner was long gone (and even if he was contactable, the warranty ceased when he handed the vehicle over to Peugeot anyway) and because the lady had informed her insurance company the reason she was having it changed was because of leaking, and not damage, the insurance refused to pay for it also. I managed to get the price dropped by about £80, but she still had a hefty bill. While you might think, and I might too, that the dealership has a moral obligation to sort this out, and pay for it, they really don't, and the problem is, no one wants to pay out when they don't have to, or can get away with not paying out. Which is why it's so hard to get money from dealerships and insurance companies; who are both professionals at not paying for things! If there isn't a legal obligation, then it can be almost impossible to get an insurance company or a dealership to pay for something they can otherwise get out of paying for...

iPhone has been in delivery for a month here in the UK I won't be guinea-pigging though, I cancelled my upgrade, and am sticking with my 4 for the time being. I did think about the BT add-on, but don't really want the drop is SQ, and I'd also lose the charge function. Plus I don't leave my BT activated on the phone, as it drains battery, so I'd have to turn it on everytime.

No?

For example, today I was working on an '06 Mondeo ST - it's just as, if not more, loaded than my IS; HID, Recaro leather, sat-nav, CD, MP3, A/C, blah blah blah. Cost (new) isn't far off each other too (neither is second hand price for that matter). Lovely car, and drives nice, but you can tell instantly the IS is more refined; it's quieter, smoother - but yet handles nicer, and just, well, nicer (for want of a better word). Then you get build quality; Ford have really stepped up their game in recent years, but fit and finish is still not on par (IMO) with the more noted "Luxury" brands of Lexus, BMW, Audi, Merc, etc. Don't get me wrong, they are nicely built, but listen to the door shutting, or the dash/door switches on a Ford (anal I know, but to me that's what separates marques). Then you get the "drive noises" that nearly all cars develop over time; the buzzes, the rattles, the squeaks. Now I'm not saying my car is as fresh as the day it was made, but 10 years and 85k later, it's STILL silent during a drive. And I do mean silent - I cannot hear a single rattle, buzz, squeak, from the interior of that car when driving it. However the ST, at 6 years old and only 40k, makes a fair bit of interior noise, if you listen for it. My friends Golf (2003, 70k) makes a HELL of a lot of rattles from the dash (unusual for a Golf, I must admit) It's the little things, at least to me, that separate the classes on cars. For others it's badges. Horses for courses. I don't see a Range Rover being anymore prestigious "just because" it's a Range Rover. But, and I really do like the Mondeo ST, those little things are what made me glad I got an IS over an ST...

I'd have had those for sure if they were 205's, but 225's are a bit on the big side for me... GLWS

If you type in Lexus IS200 HID kit 9006R, you get NO results :P

Chris - what did you pay and where did they come from? Got a link? Also, the headlight washers can be fitted to the TTE bumper - on the inside are the markings for where to cut, and you just use the standard washers to fit into the bumper. Pete - 370560559698

Does that mean you're not at Atomic anymore Tony?