Linas.P

It is still going to be like 50% in 20 min or something, but there is another issue - fast charging degrades batteries far quicker.

Yes.. the best I have seen in IS250 was ~44MPG, but somebody managed 48 or 49... maybe a run downhill. As much as I liked 4GR-FSE - happy engine, which liked to rev, was reliable, light, compact, sounded good and delivered decent power for it's size... by the time Lexus put it in GS mk4 and IS mk3 ins 2012/2013... it was effectively obsolete. Sadly, Lexus never updated 4GR-FSE which as you said was first introduced in 2003 Toyota Crown. I think it still had life in it if Lexus would have added Dual-injection (both port and direct) like 2GR-FSE and Atkinson-cycle, maybe paired it with new 8speed gearbox as they did for 350. This probably would have added 15-20hp and 5-10MPG making it a viable engine for few more years. I think what actually killed 4GR-FSE were stupid emission regulations and fundamentally wrong testing methodology which is easy to abuse with Turbochargers. What is sad that they had all the tech already available, both Atkinson cycle and injectors were in other engines and development would be minimal. No... instead they spent 100s of millions developing new smaller turbocharged engine to abuse the testing methodology and make artificially low emissions test. The reality is that 8AR-FTS is terrible engine and in any practical conditions consumes much more fuel and likewise pollutes much more... but on paper it has lower CO2, hence lower tax and that is why car manufacturers all downsizing and turbocharging.

Actually, interesting video for consideration... I think what many people still don't understand is how tiny the EV market really is. It is less than 10% of new cars and less than 1% of all cars on roads - so it is not large by means. That is I am sure EU, US and Japan does not mind Chinese imports - for now! Actually, I think EU is trying to catch the China in it's own game... you see China had no auto industry, Europeans (mostly) got there and created the industry, likes of Volkswagen, BMW, MB and GM are what created China auto industry. However, Chinese were smart - you see... you can't own business in China outright and you must be in shared partnership with Chinese person at the maximum shares ration of 51% to 49%, meaning Chinese partner will always have final say. What this means all these big automakers by now have been scammed out of their know how and technology and have no way out of China after spending billion on building their automotive industry. Sure that allows them to sell the cars in the biggest market and they made most of the money back, but the infrastructure and technology they have built is there to stay. It think EU is playing the same game - for now it allows Chinese companies to build factories and invest into EV technology, but once ICE bans comes in and EV market becomes major market, they will lock Chinese companies in. Meaning that all IP, technology and the factories will be locked in the EU and it will be Europeans making EVs for Europeans out of Chinese factories in Europe... and then Europe will have more leverage about business terms European businesses are subjected in China. Now that is my guess assuming Europeans are not stupid (which is big assumption) and that they/we will have political will to follow truth with this plan.

Gen 4 has Atkinson-cycle engine, so in theory it should be more fuel efficient when cruising, I just don't know how much impact that makes. I think generally all the cars get's better MPG on motorway than in town, except of very small hybrids (like Prius or CT I guess). Even smoothing like NX300h will get better MPG as long as you don't go past ~65-70MPH, but it simply not going to be as good as one would expect from non-hybrid car... i.e. lets say normal petrol car will do 26 in town and 40 on motorway, where hybrid may do 35 in town and 40 on motorway. If one is expect same increase from hybrid, then hybrid probably should do 50, but they don't and that is why people say are no good for motorways. It doesn't means consumption is worse than in the city, just that it is not as high as one would expect.

It certainly doesn't hurt the engine as long as everything else is in good order i.e. oil level is correct and car is regularly services. 4GR-FSE likes to be revved and the higher it goes the better it sounds... so as far as hurting the car I would not be concerned. However, it just feels wrong when you cursing along after lifting the accelerator and car just revs itself for no reason... feel literally like gearbox fault/stuck in gear. Further it has effect of engine braking, meaning the car slows down much faster after letting off the accelerator - again not entirely desirable if one just wants to cruise along after overtaking.

Honestly... it was just too good value. I was mainly servicing my car in Lexus, because I could not get cheaper service anywhere else. I think for IS250 2 year plan was something like £390 (275+115?) but often discounted further... I think I paid like £285 last time. Compared to awful places like Kwik-scam and Halfrauds, it is not much more expensive (both costing ~£320), just without risk of being defrauded. I would never trust those places to even look at my car never mind touch it. I would trust ATS Euromaster or Toyota for service, but they both actually charge more than Lexus (~400-500). And finally with Lexus you can always choose to take brand new Lexus as courtesy car... instead of being stuck in something silly like Toyota Aygo and even that one for extra £30 charge. I think original idea was to use it as a marketing tool for customers with car between 5-10 years old i.e. bring owners in give them new Lexus to drive, find £2000 worth of issues on their old car and then upsell them with upgrade. In reality it mostly attracted customers like me with 200k 12year old cars i.e. people who you can't get into your new cars and who simply ignore astronomical bills and just sticks with whatever is included in the bill.

It adds no power, but makes accelerator more sensitive. Apart of that, not much change just that instead of needing to press accelerator all the way to the floor you could get same result by pressing it half way. Generally not a bad thing, but sadly it as well unnecessary keeps gear very low for long time... so for example if you overtook the car, the engine will stay in 3rd gear/5000RPM for excessive amount of time instead of shifting back to more reasonable 5/6th gear at 60MPH. I personally left it on ETC (in some car called Normal) as I could achieve the same thing by simply pressing accelerator further, but without downside of gearbox getting stuck in too low gear for too long. On normal mode it shift-up as soon as you release the accelerator and I much prefer that.

Yes, it could be the case... but as I said there is always an option to inspect car next day after initial excitement wears out. Obviously... as I and other said, ask all the questions before delivery and have everything in writing. Even open ended questions like "are there any imperfections on pain/leather/dash", "any stone chip on windscreen" or "any other mechanical problems you know of" can work. If they say no and there are imperfections that crates perfect reason to reject the car or to ask for it to be addressed.

Mine one was with non-existent brakes where after less than 3000 miles rear pads were already metal on metal and front ones were ~1mm left. As well discs themselves were worn past minimum recommended thickness. I must say that after little bit of arguing Lexus gave in and replaced all brakes and pad for free + did free MOT. However the key part in the story was that I had all discussion in e-mail so they could not argue much. In my opinion 150 points check is little bit of a joke, because it is Lexus scoring themselves, so it is not independent and clearly has some conflict in interests. I would assume margin on used cars sale is low, especially on ex-lease cars, so fixing every detail would make dealers unprofitable. All in all, I would not be afraid buying car distantly, but I would keep all discussion in writing and would inspect car very carefully after deliver, even better during delivery. If anything a miss I would reject the car on the sport or would ask dealership to commit to fixing all the issues free of charge. Actually, distant buying is even better when it comes to statutory rights - because if you missed something during the test drive when you are under pressure and excited it could be argued it wasn't broken as you would have seen it. Whereas when you buying distantly, that is further reason for your to say - "it was there, I just could not notice, because I bought the car distantly". This leaves you more time to carefully inspect the car without any pressure from sales person and at the time and place convenient for you. Statutory rights still applies even if you test drove the car as all fault are considered to be pre-existent up to 6 month after purchase, but it may be harder to argue some wear and tear items. Whereas on distant sale you could reject the car and don't even feel bad about it. As simple as - if it wasn't in the description, then you could not know about it.

That is because you are in west midlands 🙂 When I was 25 my insurance was like £3800 on IS220d... so I kind of averaged for UK... in the cities very expensive, in the smaller towns not so expensive. Yes IS220d could be dangerously appealing for somebody not very familiar with the brand or particular model. On paper they are well equipped and modern looking cars and Lexus has name for reliability. However, IS220d could be real disaster, I even argued at one point - Lexus should buy them back and crush them. Problem is that every other Lexus model are amazingly reliable, easily in top 3 most reliable brands there are, but in particular IS220d could let down people massively and leave wrong lasting impression about the brand. IS220d deliver reasonable MPG when they work... sadly most of them don't work by now.

GS300h is ~£15-£25 cheaper to service than GS250, whereas GS450h is £15-£25 more expensive. Strangely, it seems that extended warranty is same £1095/24 Month on all 3... making GS450h (and especially GS-F) very attractive with warranty. Insurance will be more expensive on more powerful car, but that is anyone's guess how much it will be. In terms of fuel consumption GS300h will be best as well... whereas between GS250 and GS450h there are load of variables - I reckon if you drive them hard GS450h will be much less efficient, but that is because it is more powerful car. But if you drive them very carefully then GS450h will be on part with GS250 in the city, but GS250 will be more economical cruising at constant motorway speed... maybe (not sure what is impact of Atkinson cycle on GS mk4). In conclusion - GS300h will be cheapest by far to run over 5 years, GS450h will be second and GS250 probably on part or even little bit more expensive. But if one does not take warranty, does not service car in dealership... then GS250 in theory is the simplest car which needs least maintenance and lest likely to go wrong. And the thing is - I would not risk GS450h without warranty, but I would be fairly comfortable running GS250 without one.

No... I just took prices quite literally oldest/cheapest GS300h vs. oldest/cheapest GS250. GS mk4 generally being very rare car it is difficult to find like for like, franchised dealers cars with 1 owner and under 60k miles and make comparison. If we set-up conditions in a way that there are only 2 cars in the market which fits the conditions, then yes - I am sure it could be set-up in a way that one or the other car gets more expensive. Further complication is that car were not made/sold on the same time and with same equipment. But whichever way you look at it, the mostly same price at lower end of the market. Actually, I decided to do prove my point numerically, but conclusion is kind of mixed - there are total 18 GS250 for sale and I compared them to 18 cheapest GS300h. Turns out average GS300h in that category is mid-2015 with 70k miles and costs ~£14k and average GS250 is mid-2012 with 57k miles and costs ~£12k. So not much between them, considering 300h are on average 3 years newer and only has 13k miles more... I think the price difference of ~2k could be justified by cars simply being newer and mostly FL models. If we adjust value based on age, trim and FL then this is what would look like: Sorry, I know it is rather small, but overall GS250 turns out to be same value "like for like" as GS300h. Obviously, it all depends on criteria e.g. I have removed £200 for each better trim level, £500 for each year newer and £2000 for FL - basically to distil the difference engine makes and trying to account for those variables. Now some people may say "FL is ugly and I rather prefer NFL...) at which point NFL GS250 will become better value.

The prices in Norway are astronomical, but so are the salaries - so no point comparing. Average British salary is like £24000... what is it in Norway? £40k? £60k? 2006-2008 IS220d in UK costs like £1500, because basically they are considered pile of junk by now. Only the later IS200d are £4000. But I do agree that cars in UK are cheaper than elsewhere - that is because when it comes to UK car ownership the car cost itself may be just half of the overall cost. Take for example IS220d... if you say 25 years old, then after paying £1500 for the car, you will have to pay another £1500 for insurance, £250 for road tax and on top of that car maintenance and fuel. So from £5000 which will cost you to own the car for a single year, only 30% will be the cost of the car itself. Not sure how it is in Norway (I thought tax on diesel cars is high?), but in other countries 90% of the cost is the car itself... you buy the car, the insurance is cheap, no road tax and you only pay as much as it cost to buy the fuel after that.

Yeah... but is kind of irrelevant... this is not addressing an issue with the time BEVs takes to charge... sure they can find things for me to do whilst it charges and make additional money out of me, but that is not what I want. I don't want to stop for 2 hours every ~200 miles to go into stinky theme park with random people or indeed visit Oxford. Nor I want to own an expensive and luxurious car, just to be put into the stinky bus with other dirty people and their kids, and to be driven to the city centre like animal, nor I want to be sticking to the schedule of any sort. If I have to get a bus for last 5 miles of my journey, that defeats the purpose of having the car in first place - what is the difference from just getting the bus to Oxford then? And this idea defeats itself on so many levels. They kind of took an issue of ICEs going into city centre, but converted it to BEVs... What is the point of park and ride if you already have an electric car... sure I understand that ICEs are not great for city centres due to pollution, but that is key advantage of EVs... so if I have EV, then I expect to be allowed to drive right into the middle of the city. Not to ride a nasty bus! In short what I expect from personal transportation experience - I want to drive door to door and if I ever need to stop, then I want to stop, grab a coffee, kick the tyres and move on in max 3-5 minutes. That is why people own their own cars instead of just using public transport.

You will be hard pushed to find GS450h nowadays for £4k, but there are absolutely thousands of different cars which are better buy at £4k than Lexus IS200/220d. But you right - Lexus diesel is never a good idea and always work out more expensive in long run than petrol IS.

Because it is synthetic - by default you get "Tahara leather" in ES and that is pure and simple fake leather. Sure it is best fake leather there is, but it is not real nonetheless. Same applies to FL IS, most entry level NX, all UX, FL RC etc. There was sneaky push for synthetic leather as standard in Lexus and you only get semi-aniline leather in Takumi ES, IS, RC, NX or higher end models like LC, RC-F, LS, RX.

Generally I agree with you, but I don't think you got your the price right... Cheapest GS250 costs the same as cheapest GS300h (£10k vs. £11k). Sure the newest GS250 will be significantly cheaper than newest GS300h - that is true, but that is because newest GS300h will be 2019 FL model, whereas newest GS250 will be 2013 pre-FL. When it comes to value for money - obviously used car will be much better value. I mean £2500 IS250 will be 80% as good car as £35000 ES300h (some may argue even better). So I think to keep it relevant the only comparison which could be made is late and nearly new FL 2017/2018 GS450h/300h vs. 2018 IS300h vs. 2018 ES300h - so those cars are comparable. And then we can see where the value is: 2017+ GS450h £28-34k 2018 GS300h £17-24k 2018+ IS300h £14-26k (28k-35k are 2020 cars only) 2018+ ES300h £22-35k So this now really shows how much better value GS and IS are compared to ES. One could get late 2017/2018 GS450h for the price of 2018 ES300h - that is good value GS, not only it is better quality car, but as well it has serious performance for the same price. Further - one could get GS300h for £5-10k less than ES300h, performance wise they will be equal, but GS is still better luxury car. And finally IS - late IS were actually worse quality than early ones (e.g. going from semi-aniline leather to tahara fake leather etc.) and this is where ES is in terms of quality and in terms of performance, except IS is more sporty handling car, again one could get £7-11k savings on IS without loosing much stuff compared to ES. So yes - ES is not great value for money if looking at "nearly new" cars and even worse if one is not fancy with latest tech and just wants luxurious and reliable car.

Yes... I would not say £1600 on IS220d is red-flag. Because that is fairly normal price for it. However, the issue is more fundamental - sorted IS220d are extremely rare (probably do no exist). The reason is rather simple - most of things which goes wrong on IS220d will cost ~£1000 to fix, HG, Injectors, DPF, Turbo even EGR if done in service... just cleaning will be £500. Which means when car itself only worth £1500 nobody will be spending that sort of money to fix it and keep it in great shape. In short - by now most of IS220d's are uneconomical to repair. If anyone insists on the diesel, then the only option are newer IS200d... and at £4000 there are still many other cars which are better for that price.

Understanding how business works in China that isn't surprising, when these companies are basically controlled at high level from CCP. Considering most large companies in China receives what could be considered unfair "state aid", I think this will lead to more protectionism in EU and US. Basically, adding punitive import duties thus making Chinese cars uncompetitive here (same as China does to "foreign" cars in China).

That is absolutely the single biggest issue for me at the moment, and I would argue BEVs market overall. If EVs would charge quickly, say 100 miles in 15s (somewhat comparable for petrol), then they could have 100 miles range and still would be fine for me... I could plan my driving around stopping every 100 miles... because let's face it - I probably would need to stop anyway... for coffee, for pee or just to stretch legs. Could I drive more - yes I probably could, but thinking about average long drive I had say London to Snowdonia or Lake District... we would stop 2, 3 maybe even 4 times... if not for me then for passengers. So then it just becomes the matter of having charging infrastructure. And when I say 100 miles I mean actual 100 miles as a worse case scenario... Because most of current 180 miles BEVs would barely do 100 miles with everything on (heater, AC, music, 4 people with their stuff etc). And you certainly don't want to be "that EV driver" when everyone comes back to the car after climbing the mountain in the rain and you say you could not put heater and AC on because that means not reaching home and getting stuck in the middle of nowhere... Obviously, 100 miles would be annoying for Euro Trips, because there you can do serious miles and only limiting factor is car range... even say my IS250 was not the best with ~350miles, compared to say BMW 530D, where you can cruise 600miles @120MPH all day long. Sure if somebody does it everyday say for work and they need to stop 5 times before reaching the client, that is not ideal, but then maybe they don't need GT coupe either. @Barry14UK ... 😁 nahhh still SUV. If they make same car just ... actual Mustang, then absolutely. @Zotto Tesla for performance - absolutely, have no issue with that, but when it comes to luxury and built quality they are pile of garbage. Chinese smartphone on the wheels... that would be accurate description of Tesla. @rayaans Actually, I am quite "sad" about these 450h+ news if they true. I have always said that issue with Lexus range was lack of engine choices and 300h turned out not to be that universal engine which meets everyone's expectations. Likewise I said if only 300h would have larger battery and more powerful electric engine maybe (sounds like 350h) or plug-in capability like BMW330e (sounds like 450h+) then IS and RC would be great cars. So now when they had discontinued both IS and RC... they finally bringing those engines in! Damn you Lexus!

I didn't say it has to be Toyota or Lexus - any feasible GT coupe or sport coupe ... Obviously definition of "feasible" is personal thing, so what I define as feasible is a mass produced car with, with at least 300 miles range, under 6s 0-60 and the price up-to or just around £40k new. That is sort of the price/ performance where Tesla Model 3 sits, meaning it is possible to make EV coupe which is "feasible", yet nobody makes one yet. Your list doesn't have any feasible EV coupe either - Taycan, E-tron GT and MB EQS are not Coupes, despite it being in their name. They are all Saloons. But even then they are feasible... by which I mean they all costs ~£100k. The most viable would be Tesla Model S/3, but as I said Tesla is not a car - it is experiment on wheels. Old SLS Electric, again not feasible - only 100 made and now sells at around £500k a piece and it could only do like 40 miles range. Polestar is not electric, but it is PHEV, but again it is horrible and it is limited production and costs £140k... for what is essentially 2 door version of Volvo S90 which costs £60k... so again not feasible car. If we looking into PHEV examples, then the closest to feasible is used BMW i8, but at original £100k price not so much. The rest what you said are all valid points, but does not defeat my point that market is filled with "boring" SUVs and Lexus is going to introduce another boring SUV. As for market "wanting SUVS" - that seems like chicken and egg situation...

So what you did address the condition of callipers? But indeed - copper grease is terrible idea as "lubricant" for slider pins, almost guaranteed way to get the stuck.

Yeah, not something I could do in my pre-facelift or any of other cars I tried with AVS. Speaking specifically about RC200t, engine response was dreadful in any mode but Sport+, however Sport+ keeps revs very high even after you let off the accelerator and it sets AVS to it's most aggressive setting, which just rattles car too much on broken London and east England roads. As such I was always split between having unresponsive engine/gearbox or harsh ride. My conclusion was that AVS was great as a mean to make car more sporty, but not really to keep it comfortable.

That is my understanding of how AVS should work in all cars, but perhaps implementation is indeed different. In my RC it felt like it was off in eco mode, car was softer and allowed some roll in corners, but even in normal mode I could feel AVS doing "something" like reducing the roll a little bit... It would be even stiffer in Sport/Sport+ and I could not feel much difference in terms of AVS - in both modes car was very stiff and planted in corners, but certainly too hard to drive on the roads (probably good for track)... and only difference in Sport+ was that car was holding revs much longer when letting off the accelerator and it was more sensitive. If Lexus would have personalised mode like BMW, then my ideal set-up would have been AVS on Normal, Accelerator on Sport+ and Gearbox rev holding on Sport. Sadly, Lexus does not allow them to be adjusted individually - it is either all or nothing. Never tried RC without AVS, so don't know how it compares, but I have tried IS with both and assumed same to be true on RC as it shares most of parts with IS. From my experience in IS mk3 - AVS and non-AVS cars felt the same in eco/normal mode, but AVS car would be more planted and level around the corers once set Sport or Sport+ mode, however I could not compare how it differed on gears/revs and accelerator as they were hybrids/CVT. So IS behaviour seems similar to what John has described on GS and opposite from what David stated on RC-F.

Despite reservations about benefit and feasibility of BEVs, I am not against idea of electric propulsion in cars as long as it is provided in truly competitive product - not funded by public and not forced upon the population. That said - could you please point me to the direction of feasible BEV sports coupe, GT coupe or even Luxury saloon? I exclude Tesla here, because Tesla is technology company and they don't make cars, they make technical feasibility study on the wheels... Teslas are horrible cars when it comes to reliability, build quality etc. And as far as I know they make no coupes for the time being. I mean if there would be EV version of Lexus RC or LC, I would be very interested. However, the news refers to yet another boring SUV... as I said.