TessierAshpool

Hi all, I recently made a video about how the air suspension works on a Lexus LS430 rom a technical point of view, thought I'd post it here in case it's of use to anyone. Also applies to LS460 and LS600H I believe. I also have a video on my channel on how to retrofit OEM parking sensors if anyone wants to check that out. Thanks

I have beige ones, I wash them with a soft plastic scrubbing brush and fairy liquid about once a month and hose off. I've power washed them in the past l, but try and keep it a bit gentler when I'm doing it regularly.

I believe you can do active tests on the damper motors, try this in Techstream, I believe they can be actively moved to more than ten positions. Your readings for the rear two sensors do seem odd! Are they set in the middle of the slot, and also have you measured your front two sensor arms to ensure they match left and right? Should be 92mm inside nuts from factory up front. You're mentioning a 5mm difference, not sure what part you mean for that? If that's the only difference at arch height, that's not much at all! I'll also put a picture of some values from mine today. The car was on Normal height setting, on flat ground with the tiniest of slopes to one side (barely noticeable). You can see the car did not try and get 0mm measurements, it adjusted the front L to R slightly to adjust for the tiny slope. On the back, they are almost identical, but you can see they are not zero. I do not know why, but clearly the car has decided this is best. From outside I felt all the gaps between the arch and wheel and they were all perfectly the same, so even though they are not 0mm, the car made good choices. Don't try and chase perfect zeros! As long as L and R are in broad agreement, the sensors are probably fine.

Grom still make units for the 430, so yes that'll be one of their older adapters. They have Bluetooth ones now. Oh and they often have 3.5mm headphone ports, so if you found the unit (it's probably behind the radio), you could remove the iPod cable and add a male to male headphone cable and then use it to plug your phone in! You could in theory get a Minidisc setup secondhand from Japan, they come up rarely though. Adapting an aftermarket changer to fit would be more difficult as you would need the Lexus connectors and to figure out all the pinouts and commands. Buying a secondhand iPod might also be an option. Attached a pic of the Japanese Minidisc unit, it installs into the upper glovebox. Minidisc was pretty big in Japan, never really took off in the West though. They even had vending style machines in Japan where you could insert a blank Minidisc and pick tracks to write to it for reasonable price. Sony Europe/USA were not keen on the format though.

Looks like an aftermarket iPod/iPhone connector for the older apple connector, yes it's most likely what's connected. If you had bought a big collection of iTunes music this sort of adapter made sense (back when you briefly bought digital music rather than streamed), but obsolete nowadays now that Bluetooth/streaming is on everything. Bluetooth compatibility was iffy back then too, so a wired connection was probably more reliable. I've heard the Bluetooth on the facelift cars isn't the best by modern standards, possibly only does calls and not music? The decade 2000-10 was a wild west of competing standards in audio, the Lexus designers tried their best by adding tape (bad choice!), CD and Bluetooth calling, and space for a CD2 expansion. There were so many competing formats though that there was plenty of aftermarket options to connect your BlackBerry, Nokia or Apple device. It was far from clear that Bluetooth would take off for music when the car was built. I think the CD2 slot was actually used by Lexus, the Japanese market Celsiors had an OEM option for a Minidisc changer, I suspect this ran as CD2.

I have an aftermarket Bluetooth receiver installed in my 430, it plugged in to the back of the existing radio/changer, and it emulates a second cd changer. So by pressing cd button I can toggle between the real changer and Bluetooth, the screen shows the transition to both as you said. I'd guess you have some sort of aftermarket system like this, either Bluetooth or aux, or aybe the second changer is rigged to your existing DVD media installation's audio out. If the integration is as seamless as my unit, you should be able to use skip buttons, volume and so on using dash and steering wheel controls.

There's actually only one exhaust solenoid on the system, at the front. Off the top of my head it's next to the pair of solenoids for distribution. I can't remember if it's its own part or bundled as part of the distribution solenoids, think it has a simple 2-wire connector. At the rear of the vehicle is another pair of DISTRIBUTION solenoids (packaged as a single part) that control the rear left/right distribution. If the car need to vent air out of the rear, it opens the distribution solenoid for the appropriate rear side, and the air returns up the single air line back to front where it escapes from the front exhaust solenoid. The car can vent any corner using a clever combination of shutting the other three corners and opening one corner while simultaneously opening the only exhaust solenoid. So if you genuinely do have an exhaust solenoid problem, it's at the front. That being said, if the system is seeing correct heights all round then it should not need to add any more air or vent it, so I would wonder whether your problem is actually incorrectly adjusted height sensors, especially as you have stated that you have messed with them. They should all have their arms flat (horizontal) when the car is on level ground and the car is "happy" with its height. That assumes "High" is not selected on dashboard. If your parking spot is on a slope or very uneven then it's theoretically possible that the car tries to compensate for a weird weight distribution there and add air to try and level the car, then when you pull away onto level ground it realises it has too much air and need to drop but can't because of a faulty exhaust valve I guess. However, definitely check the sensor arms are horizontal first, as that's a simple visual check you can do in any flat place which can be interpreted to tell you where to check next before you make another expensive purchase that doesn't help. If an arm points upwards, that corner is low and the car should be trying to pump it up. If pointing downwards, that corner is high and the car should try and vent (unless it physically can't drop any more due to poor rod adjustment). If flat, car should be happy (even if rods are maladjusted, that's outside the scope). Finally, you mentioned"C1725 Damping force control actuator" as well. The actuator is the little black stepper motor that twists onto the top of each strut when you install them, they control the damper of the strut, and twist a little motor inside when you select "Sport" mode. They're not usually problematic, so check you have twisted it back on properly and remembered to reattach the wiring for it.

For anyone that sees this in the future - I contacted the Lexus Certificate of Conformity department to check if my late 2000 registered model LS430 was in principle Euro 4 compliant before I paid them for a certificate. They have just got back to me, and stated that based on my VIN, my car is not Euro 4 - it was Euro 3 compliant when built. To quote the email from Lexus: So it looks like many (most?) LS430 are Euro 4 compliant (and therefore ULEZ exempt), but some of the early ones like mine are not. Shame.

Thank you Steve. £75 is pricey mind you! I might hold off until I'll need it, most likely for the 2021 ULEZ expansion.

Sorry to dig up an old thread, but I've got a late 2000 LS430 and according to TfL it is not compliant - I am assuming that as 2001 and 2002 cars have been marked as compliant mine should be too and I can dispute this, but according to TfL I need a certificate from Lexus. Does anyone know who at Lexus to speak to about this, as the dealership likely won't be interested in a 20 year old car! (V5 on the car does not show any emissions or Euro status info. I'm asking as, although I live in beautiful Devon, I have family who have moved up to London). Thanks!