Britprius

It would be wise to have some slide pin grease handy to re grease the slide pins while you have the calipers off. These are known for seizing causing the pads to ware on one side. Lexus will then offer to replace the calipers for a little over £300 each. Some copper slip should also be applied to the back of the pads, and shims. John

The adjustment is made at the top of this rod by slackening the 10 mm nut and sliding the bolt along the slot in the required direction. John.

Adjusting the headlamp height is much easier by adjusting the ride height rod on the NS front suspension. This adjusts both headlamps at the same time without having to keep moving out of the beam to see how your doing. It only requires the steering on a left hand lock, and slackening one 10 mm nut. John

The beams are aimed perfectly and the bulbs are new genuine Phillips. I live in a very rural area with no street lighting, and going from main beam to dip when a car comes in the other direction the lighting goes almost into darkness. Cars behind me often light the road in front of me better than my headlamps. The headlamps are clean, and in good condition.This is in comparison to a gen2 Prius with old technology single bulb halogen headlamps that lit the road well. John

In a bid to improve the inadequate low beam HID lights on the GS450H I am converting them from D4S 35 watt to D2S 55 watt to see what improvements can be made. The D2S HID's are marginally brighter on a watt for watt basis, but I believe there is another 10 to 15% improvement to be gained by going to 55 watts. I will report back on my findings. John

Can anyone point me in the right direction for the front side light fuse on the GS450H just the fuse number would help. The hand book, and fuse box cover does not appear to list the front fuse, but lists the rear. My rear side lights are working but the fronts are not. The bulbs have been changed, and a check for voltage at the bulb holders produces zero volts across the terminals, and to chassis ruling out a bad ground. If anyone has a wiring diagram that would be most welcome. John.

Only if all you wan't to do is drive a car. Apart from the £100 needed for a signature from your doctor, and optician if you wish to keep entitlements. I do voluntary work driving a mini bus for local groups, and to the nearest hospital that is 28 miles away at Hereford. The nearest doctors surgery is 6 miles away. Hereford town is also the only place in the county that has a manned police station, and council office. So need to keep my licence in tacked, and yes much to the dismay of some here I do tow a caravan. Where I live we have 2 buses a week to the nearest town "Leominster" The bus leaves my village at 9.30 am on a Tuesday, and Friday, and takes 75 minutes to get to the town 9 miles away. The bus goes via many other villages at leased doubling the journey length. It starts the return journey at 1.0 pm. Now you can get a train from Leominster to Hereford, but by the time you get there there is not enough time to get back to catch the bus home. This makes voluntary drivers a must in rural areas. Rural life has some advantages, but it comes with many disadvantages. John The law will have to be amended as the working age for men, and women goes up.

When you reach 70 the licence only last for 3 years. Further unless you send for the extra forms, "which they do not supply automatically" to fill in you loose you licence for towing a trailer, and any heavy vehicles your old licence allowed you to drive. You then have to take a test to tow a caravan. In my case I had to send for a third set of forms that had to be signed by my doctor (£60), and my optician (£40) to get my "free" driving licence back with my entitlements. This will have to be done every 3 years. My wife's licence expired because of the 10 year rule 4 months before she was 70. I rang the DVLA on here behalf about renewing it just for the 3 years, but no deal. She had to renew it twice in 4 months. John

It's quite normal to reuse the old shims if they are in good condition. They are as there name implies flat pieces of thin steel between the pads, and the calipers. They are usually sold separately to the pads although some years ago the better manufacturers supplied them with new pads. They do deteriorate over time through rust or metal fatigue, and yes some mechanics if you can call them that discard them. If the shims are not there then replacing them should cure the problem. If not they can always be used with the replacement pads. John

First check the if the anti rattle shims are in place, and in good condition. Lightly grease with copper slip all surfaces of the shims, and file off a small shamfer on the leading edges of the pads. If this fails then change the pads for OEM. John

There are numerous post on this subject. I have the same problem. The recommendation is to push felt strips down between the screen, and the plastic dash panels. This seems to fix the problem for some, but everything I have tried brings little in the way of results. Cold weather seems to make it worse. I have seriously considered stripping out the dash and rebuilding it, but need the car in a driveable condition most of the time. The fact that the car is otherwise so quiet makes it seem worse, but this is not good for a "quality" car. John.

I believe the OEM parts are over priced , but many would disagree so the choice is your's. I once had a Mazda that required a rear wheel bearing replaced. The dealers price was an eye watering £425. Being in industry at the time I sourced a bearing at "Bearing Services Ltd" at a cost of £28, but being in a hurry near a bank holiday had to collect it from Fafnir bearings at Lichfield where the man on the trade counter said "next time you need one of these come direct as it will save you 30%". After the old bearing was removed you've guest it. The OEM was a fafnir bearing. John

Yes you can charge the module once it is assembled in the pack as this provides the the correct side support. Although your charger may have a trickle charge rate of 2 amps this assumes a lead acid battery rated at about 13.2 volts is being charged. Connecting it to one Lexus module with an output of just over half that figure could double that figure of 2 amps. The module voltage should be it's voltage after standing, and not connected to the charger. The output of one module fitted in the Lexus is only 7.2 volts nominal "this could be as high as 9 volts depending on the level of charge". In use on the car the maximum charge level is 80% with a minimum discharge level of 40%. These are the levels represented by the bar level display, So with one pink bar showing the charge level is at about 45% not nearly zero as some believe. John.

I beg to differ on this. Nmhi do not suffer problems from being stored in a completely discharged state, and is in fact the desired method of storing this type of cell chemistry. If you charge it every 6 months you will be fully charging it where as in the vehicle it never gets charged above 80% of capacity. This is done to increase dramatically the number of cycles the battery is capable of. Charging the modules fully should only be done to balance charge them "bring all the cells within a module to a fully charged state" or if you are going to put the module to use. Then charge it to the same voltage as the other modules in the battery. Tim. Charge the replacement module to the same voltage as the others. If you have an old transformer type battery charger you can use that with a 21watt 12 volt indicator bulb in series with the module to restrict the charge current. If you have a modern switch mode charger I doubt it will work because it will not see enough voltage from the module to trigger the charger. You may be lucky refurbishing your battery replacing just one module, but equally you may find yourself playing "whack a mole". There are many many pages of what to do on the Prius chat forum to ensure reliable results, but it is very time consuming (weeks), and requires a methodical approach with lots of patience. On no account charge the module unless it is clamped at the sides with pieces of timber in a vice or with "G" clamps. Failure to do this will have it blow up like a balloon. John.

The touch screens of early Toyota/Lexus cars suffer with cracking soldered joints on a plug and socket arrangement between two circuit boards in the screen assembly. On later cars the solder pads were increased in size to cure the problem This can be repaired if your handy with a soldering iron. Full instructions can be found on the Prius chat forum. Do a search on intermittent MFD display. The LCD touch screens themselves can also be obtained "not from Toyota or Lexus" in case of damage caused by the use of suction cups to hold phones, and such on the screen. Why someone would do that I do not know, but it does happen.

Wait until the shock absorbers start leaking then you will see some posts! However in some ways I do agree with a separate area for the GS hybrids. Just look at the number of IS sections. John.

The ball joints do not seem to ware out in pairs so I would leave it. The struts are made of quite thick material, and I have never come across a failure/breakage due to rust usually round the bottom area mounting. A wire brush and some black flat "Hammeright" will protect them. Wait until they start leaking oil from the top as that will stop the rust at the bottom, and will then need to be changed anyway at about £300 each just for parts. The tester has got the description wrong on the shock absorbers as they are not truly Macpherson struts. John

I cannot recommend the EfficienGrip tyres "even though they do not fit" I had a set of these on my Prius and they only lasted 18,000 miles with even ware. The sidewall gave out on one at only 5000 miles. I had been warned about the weak sides on the tyres before buying. The Hankooks Kinergy tyres that replaced them lasted over 40,000 miles, and had similar ratings. John.

The lower ball joint is from £30 upwards for a non OEM part "Ebay" plus fitting. Any mechanic should be capable of replacing this in about an hour, but a check on the front tracking will be required. The anti roll bar bushes are easy to replace and are cheap to buy, but I would not replace these if they are not giving trouble. John

Yes that is the switch I was talking about. You say " You can hear a pump working when you press the washers but that is only for the headlight washers which work" but the headlamp pump should not run when the switch is in the "off" position. John

Are you sure the switch in the drop down compartment with the boot and fuel filler openers the switch for the headlamp washers is in the headlamp washer off position? John

A grove ground along the slide pins preferably in a spiral path, but straight is ok will hold more grease and allow it to travel along the pins more readily from the blind hole end of the caliper. This works better than increasing the clearance, and avoids the rattle cause by to much clearance. John.

While I agree with you generally on the reliability of Lexus cars. The shock absorbers used on Toyota/Lexus cars "KYB" are not reliable. My last car was a Prius on which the rear shock absorbers were replaced under guarantee at 30,000 miles because they were leaking oil. The car then did a further 100,000 miles without problems till I sold it for the Lexus GS450H. The GS has now had according to the records I have two complete sets of shocks in 115,000 miles. All because they were leaking! Now either the shocks are not up to the job, or the fitment on the GS is putting a load on them they were not designed to carry, the fitment is allowing contamination from road grit to destroy the seals. Having dismantled some GS shocks the internal components are in good order with just the seal being at fault. On some the chrome shaft has an area of chrome about 3/16 inches wide around the shaft eaten away. This area seems to co-inside with the position that the seal sits when the car is stationary or moving on a smooth surface. The seal has two lips facing in opposite directions. One down to stop oil leaving the shock, and the other up to wipe away water and dirt off the shaft. If this upward facing seal allows any dirt or moisture past it this contamination is trapped between the two seal lips a distance of about 3/16 inch. It is this contamination that I am convinced that is eating away the chrome surface. Once the chrome surface is damaged the oil in the shock absorber can be pushed out as the seal rides over the damaged area buy the high pressure nitrogen charge, and pressure caused by the normal action of the shock in use. Surly the shock absorber manufacturer KYB, and Toyota/Lexus must by now know of this problem. However they seem happy to let customers pay the price when perhaps a small redesign of the seal "that must cost pennies" or more suitable protection from contamination would extend the longevity of the components. This seal is also fitted in such a manner that makes it impossible to replace under normal circumstances. John.

I think the "shaking" is a feature of the headlamps as mine does this as well on good potholes, or if I knock the headlamp units with my hand. John

Yes that's the animal. Adjust it at the top. Make sure the ball joints have free movement while you are there. John