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Everything posted by sorcerer
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Excellent job Lee, looks really good and much better than the wood in my opinion. Where did you get the wrap?
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Todays jobs
sorcerer replied to Z28DUNC's topic in LS 400 / Lexus LS 430 / Lexus LS 460 / Lexus 600h / Lexus 500h Club
Well, having the bulb in situ sort of detracts from the LEDs - much better with the LEDs on their own IMHO. As I explained above, the flasher unit needs to see 2 x 21W + 5W for the side repeaters + maybe a very small amount for the dashboard tell-tale, so say about 50W to work properly and avoid hyperflashing. Losing a 21W bulb and adding a 5W to the LED's couple of Watts will not do it as you'd still be 14W down. If you want LEDs you need load resistors or a flasher unit designed for LEDs. 50W 6Ω resistors can be bought here for £2.22 inc VAT plus delivery Maybe you can get them for a better price elsewhere but I only live about a mile from CPC so it's my 'go to' place. -
My RX300 was a 2005 model (05-plate) so no, yours is definitely not too old and he's just talking cobblers. I could adjust timings of interior lights, sensitivity of rain sensor, bleep when opening/closing tailgate and other stuff like that. The car didn't autolock, didn't beep when locking/unlocking and didn't beep when in reverse - but now that I think about it, I don't remember seeing a customisation menu for any of those three parameters, but it has been a while so I may be wrong. I've not tried it yet on my RX450h as we've only had the car about six weeks and we've just been so busy, but I'm confident that it should work perfectly well. Your problem could be something to do with the drivers for the miniVCI cable; I remember it took quite a bit of messing to get it to work properly, but I was trying to get it on Windows 10 Pro 64-bit. I managed it in the end and it now works well, but most people say that an old laptop running Windows XP is the easiest to setup.
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Like I said above, I've done almost 15 years without a spare tyre due to running on LPG. What I didn't say above is that that also includes our summer holidays when we've driven to, and toured around, Poland/Czech Republic/Slovakia (averaging about 4,000 mile round trip) with nothing but a can of goo and a breakdown telephone number. I know you were talking about work but really, the chances of punctures these days are relatively slim.
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Remember that even with Techstream, these parameters may not be adjustable (may be illegal to not have these things in the Japanese market). Not everything is adjustable, although I do think that auto-locking probably will be, even if the others aren't. Beeps on lock/unlock are not illegal - many cars do this. Have you tried looking on Youtube? There are loads of videos on how to use Techstream, at least on a general level, but I don't know if any will cover your specific needs.
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RX-300 a bit beepy
sorcerer replied to m4rkw's topic in RX 300 / RX 350h / RX 400h / RX 200t / RX 450h+ / RX 500h Club
No idea to be honest. I would imagine that the beeping when (un)locking may be some setting in the Body ECU and the reversing beep may be to do with the ATM ECU. Just go through each ECU and each setting within the ECU and you should eventually find it - if it's adjustable, that is. It's worth spending some time just going through every setting you can find anyway, just to see what you can do with Techstream. Just be sure to only look, and don't click on anything actionable unless you know what you're doing or it's something obvious and/or something trivial like adjusting how long the cabin lights stay on after locking the door or similar stuff - otherwise you may end up bricking the car! -
That sounds very worrying! Professional auto electricians should not be swapping light clusters around as a method of diagnosis. One leg of a multimeter on the positive wire and the other on an earth would show the presence (or otherwise) and value of a voltage. Also, to just be told "one isn't working" isn't very good either - why isn't it working and can it not be repaired rather than replaced? Who is this "well renowned auto electrical garage"?
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Ghetto key repair
sorcerer replied to m4rkw's topic in RX 300 / RX 350h / RX 400h / RX 200t / RX 450h+ / RX 500h Club
This guy on eBay will supply an empty key case (so that you can put your own electronics into it) and will also cut the key blade to the key code if you have it or to a photo of your existing key, all for under £15 including delivery. A lot of the blanks on eBay are made from very 'hard' metal and can damage key cutting machinery, which is why a lot of shops won't cut one, or as you've found out, even if they manage to cut it, it doesn't really work well. -
RX-300 - what is S-mode?
sorcerer replied to m4rkw's topic in RX 300 / RX 350h / RX 400h / RX 200t / RX 450h+ / RX 500h Club
Yes, aaand.... sort of It's meant to be a sort of manual change in that you nudge the lever up to change up and down to change down. However, once or twice, not being used to it and getting myself a little flustered, the box does change automatically anyway if you somehow mess things up. On one occasion I put it into S to do a quick overtake but, being used to it changing automatically, I forgot to change up and when it got to somewhere around 4500-5000 revs the box did it for me anyway. -
And I'll go the exact opposite of Richard For the best part of about 15 years I've never carried a spare wheel due to the fact that every car I've had in that time ran on LPG and the LPG tank was in the spare wheel well. I carried a can of goo for small punctures and would have called out the breakdown people if it was too big a puncture for the goo to handle. I'm happy to say that in all that time we never had a single puncture so I've never had to use either method, but there are many instances over on the LPG Forum where members have used the goo and no one has ever had a problem getting a tyre repaired after being 'gooed'. Some tyre fitters are lazy and don't like cleaning out the goo, but there's no practical chemical or physical reason other than that why a gooed tyre can't be repaired.
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Hello David and welcome to the forum. I've never had an LS460 so I'm afraid that I can't help but I'm sure someone will be along soon who can. I've never quite understood why the board has a 'New Members' area when most folk become members to ask about specific models, so my advice would be to also post your question in the LS-specific (LS400, 430, 460 and 600h) area, where you'll probably get the best answers. Cheers, John
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All it would need is an inspection by a "UKLPG Approved Installer" and, providing that it complies with UK rules and regs, they will issue a certificate that is acceptable to all insurance companies and other interested parties. UKLPG are a trade body. In other words, you pay a membership fee and they let you into their club. It isn't government run or funded and it has no legal standing, but they've done a good job in convincing the authorities that they know best.
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Todays jobs
sorcerer replied to Z28DUNC's topic in LS 400 / Lexus LS 430 / Lexus LS 460 / Lexus 600h / Lexus 500h Club
Sorry, too late to edit the above post now but just spotted a mistake I made earlier. That last line reads "to make the front flashers work normally, otherwise they hyperflashed" but the word front shouldn't be in there. -
Todays jobs
sorcerer replied to Z28DUNC's topic in LS 400 / Lexus LS 430 / Lexus LS 460 / Lexus 600h / Lexus 500h Club
No, it shouldn't work unless your LEDs already have a built-in load resistor - some of them do. Like I said above, the indicator bulbs are rated at 21W so one at the front and one at the back makes 42W, plus side repeater and the dash 'tell tale' should all add up to somewhere north of 50W. Therefore, the flasher unit is designed to flash at the 'normal' rate when it has a load of more than 50W. If a bulb blows and you lose 21W, the flasher unit should go into hyperflash mode to show you that something is wrong, so replacing a 21W incandescent bulb with something like a 2W LED will cause hyperflashing unless there are load resistors somewhere in the circuit. If you look at a topic I posted a while back on fitting dual LED daytime running lights/flashers to my RX300, the rear bulbs are still incandescent but I had to install load resistors to make the front flashers work normally, otherwise they hyperflashed: -
Todays jobs
sorcerer replied to Z28DUNC's topic in LS 400 / Lexus LS 430 / Lexus LS 460 / Lexus 600h / Lexus 500h Club
No, you'll definitely need to use either load resistors or to change the flasher unit to one that is specifically intended for LEDs like this one here. If, for example, the indicators normally flash at 40 times per minute, when a bulb goes the system will flash at, say, 120 times per minute, which is the car's way of telling you that something is wrong. Flasher bulbs are rated at 21W, so the flasher unit is designed to operate under a load of 42W (plus a small wattage for the dash indicator bulb and side repeaters, but you get the idea). LEDs are rated at perhaps a couple of Watts, so the flasher unit thinks the bulbs have blown and it hyperflashes, hence the need for load resistors - to make the system draw the 42W necessary to operate the flasher unit properly. -
Our Advance has a sunroof but I wasn't bothered about having one. I've never quite seen the point in having a sunroof in a car that has climate control, the whole idea of which is to set the cabin temperature to what you want and the car just keeps it there for you - plus, as I'm 'thinning out on top' a bit, an open sunroof would lead too easily to a sunburnt head!
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At the beginning of February we bought a 63-plate RX450h Advance (first registered in November 2013) and we love it. We got it from Lexus Teeside and paid £24,980 and it had 33,500 miles on it. As far as I know, the RX450h is a very reliable car with no major problems to worry about. However, we purposely avoided the Premier model because I absolutely did not want air suspension. It adds almost nothing to the comfort and ride over and above normal coil suspension but it does introduce a whole new level of complexity that is very expensive to sort out if it goes wrong. As a new owner, only time will tell but we love it!
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Every summer for the last 20-odd years, my wife and I have driven to, and toured around, Poland/Czech Republic/Slovakia for our holidays and it is indeed a beautiful country with some fantastic scenery and amazing architecture and history, and the people are very warm and friendly too. Definitely highly recommended to visit, although not necessarily for your LPG conversion. If you wanted to incorporate the conversion time into a holiday there then yes, fair enough, go for it, but no need to go there just for that - the pictures I posted are of a conversion done here in the UK. If you want more details, feel free to email me on jhewitt1958@gmail.com and I'll be happy to help.