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There's nothing in that article that suggests this is anything more than the "approved used" bull**** that goes on in nearly every used car salesyard in the country. Toyota will hoover the carpets, upgrade the software, throw some new tyres on it and then sell it at a premium because it's "manufacturer refurbished". I can't imagine they're going to replace anything they don't need to. Ex-leases will normally be in reasonably good shape already as they're required to be serviced and nobody wants to get stung when they return it. What this article really seems to be saying is "wow, this country elected Boris Johnson as their leader. they'll literally buy anything. party time!"

If I was in the market right now I'd take your hand off for that 🙂 Good luck

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Hinyx-Mag-Safe-Magnetic-Wireless-Compatible-Black/dp/B08Q7KLBDD/ This is just brilliant if you have a 12 series phone or later.

I would hazard a guess that if he’s topping up the washer fluid the washers are working ;)

Yes I agree but I think you're missing the point. If the car *hasn't* been maintained according to the schedule and the transmission has a high number of miles with the original fluid, I can understand a dealer being reluctant to service it because if it then fails sometime after they might be blamed. As long as the customer accepts that the lack of service is the cause of such an event then a service is certainly not going to harm anything and might even buy them some time, but some people may not believe this and might try to hold the dealer accountable for the failure. This might explain the advice that @Boersma apparently received.

It doesn't sound like something that should be an MOT fail, it's clearly not a safety issue. Maybe you can find a tester who'll pass it or just note it as an advisory?

Absolutely, but the directives of the manufacturer probably don't include a provision of specifically what to do if a car comes in with 100k on the clock and no transmission service history.

Indeed but I suspect there isn't anything that specifically mentions what to do if the unit hasn't been serviced appropriately. Dealers may be wary of advising service on such units because they're likely to fail at any point due to the lack of service. If a customer has their transmission serviced and it then fails sometime after they might (wrongly, in my opinion) blame the dealer. Simply advising customers not to service it mitigates this risk on their part, despite it being bad advice.

I'm curious to know exactly where you got this information from as I believe it to be false. A proper service (drain, fill, replace filter) can never really hurt the transmission. If this was relayed by a Lexus dealer the likely reason is that they know after 100k with no servicing the chances of a transmission failure are much higher, so if someone has it serviced and then the unit fails sometime thereafter the customer might try to blame the dealer. But it won't be the service that killed the transmission, it was the 100k miles of prior lack of service.

Some stuff like this can be disabled with techstream, might be worth a look? I turned off the seatbelt warning on my wife's car because she often pootles around her allotment in it and found them annoying.

Chucking this lady a couple of hundred quid for her inconvenience is barely even a speeding ticket to Halfords. I wonder if this plus the bad press is really going to be much incentive to improve.

I don't know for sure but I would guess it's probably coded, those are typically code-once things so after the initial programming it can't be reused. You could try looking at the ECU repair places, I don't have one to recommend but it could be something as simple as a blown cap on the board which would be easily fixed by a specialist.

https://www.pistonheads.com/buy/listing/12747979 Looks like a nice example but they're dreaming at that price

I suspect they're rarer than an honest tory but if you happen to stumble across an RX-300 with the 2.4L you might consider that as an alternative. I really like mine, fuel economy is about the same as an RX400h but with fewer toys and no hybrid battery to eventually fail. I'm a fan of simplicity. Good luck in any case

At that mileage it should have been serviced about 4 times, if it hasn't been then the fluid will be long depleted now, seals will be getting hard and possibly leaking. Have you checked the fluid level with the dipstick? I tend to agree with Phil, take it to a transmission specialist.

When you get the quote for the repair, I would ask the garage to give the car a thorough inspection and tell you what shape the rest of it's in. Then you'll be in a more informed position to decide whether to proceed with it or not. Personally if my car needed an engine repair or a transmission I don't think I'd even hesitate, lets say it needed a £3k repair, what the hell else am I going to buy for £3k that would be already exactly set up how I like it, well-maintained (by me), up to date on all maintenance etc.

Cool Steve was right then! https://lexus-europe.epc-data.com/gs300_430_460/grs190r/5059/chassis/3501/35000/?frame_no=JTHBH96S105024422

I assume you're inferring a build date after 01.2005 Steve, how did you determine that? I wasn't sure as my own car is a 56 plate but was built before 2006.01 and so uses the parts from that earlier time range. The part for 07.2000 - 01.2005 is different: https://lexus-europe.epc-data.com/gs300_430/jzs160r/5048/chassis/3501/35000/ @GS3UK if you put your vin number in and then paste us the link it takes you to that would be handy so we know we have the right frame code

The vin plate itself may also indicate the transmission, mine does

Did you try putting your vin number into www.epc-data.com?

It is often irritating that cars aren't all open source. On my wife's car which is a Toyota Rav-4 if you remove the key and open the drivers door having left the lights on it makes an irritating constant beep to remind you to turn them off. On my car, a Toyota Harrier built two years prior to hers, if you do the same thing it just switches the lights off for you. I checked with Techstream, no way to set the same behaviour on hers. It's such a simple thing in software terms but the computers are all proprietary.

The 2-in-1 definitely works, I imagine there's probably not a big difference.

Cool 🙂 Or £2 for the asda version: https://groceries.asda.com/product/car-cleaning/auto-drive-anti-fog-class-cleaner/1000103683174 (no idea if it works)

I used this: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00BHEALV6/ yesterday, and it's excellent, does just what the stuff that comes with the PIAA wipers do. very happy.

If you have automatic wipers don't even consider getting it replaced anywhere other than the dealer, the rain sensor will never work properly again and the likes of AutoGlass will not care or help you.