Honey, Something Is Wrong With My Lexus

[McGuyver]

My wife's 99 ES300 has 135K miles, runs like a top, but she has complained about the lights flickering while she is driving - I will check the battery and alternator, but I was wondering if there is something else I should look for if I find nothing wrong there.

She has also said that the car squeals a bit braking and makes the steering wheel "jerk back and forth" - I drove the car and with light braking, there is an initial short squeal, but quiets with more pressure, under hard braking there is heavy shutter Okay, I know that this probably has to do with either the pads, calipers, or more likely the rotors ( warped). My question is - If it is the rotors, do I really need to replace front and rear since the biggest part of the load is on the front, and should I go for the metallic pads to reduce dust?

[backwoods lex]

Sounds like my car. 2000 ES, 130K. Somethings been going on with the electrical system that caused all of the lights to flicker when idling. Not too bad, but noticeable. It's the headlights, dome light, and brake lights.

Same thing with the brakes. My rotors are warped and vibrate whenever I stop even slightly fast. It was horrible when going downhill. I got my tires balanced which helped a lot, but I still need new rotors. And for some reason, despite pad changes and adjustments, my brakes frequently make noise. The car still runs well and I have never really had any significant problems out of it. Not much help, just letting you know I don't think it's an uncommon problem.

[Toysrme]

Warped rotors & low pad level. You replace whatever is out of specification, or going to be out of specification. Our cars adjust the brake bias on the fly depending on the loading of the rear suspension. So even tho the front typical will wind up doing aound 80% of the braking during hard braking. During about any normal stopping action, you'd be surprized at the proportion the rears do. Almost half on this older ES & they didn't really change the brakes substantually from 92-05 so...

Basically, the biased on more modern systems adjusts itself via weight transfer. If you're not transferring alot of weight (Which is obvious to observe on our cars due to the horribly soft springs.), you'll wear the rears out not long after the fronts.

Check/replace the battery, alternator & the major grounding points in the car.

Always use quality anti-squeal on ever mating surface between the pad backing, shim, second shim & piston. Re-use shims if you have to, ALWAYS have the shims.

It takes about 100 miles of very easy little braking driving for pads to be OK, and Brembo says it takes rotors about 1,000 miles of gentle driving.

Whatever Brmbo says pretty much goes for me...

[SKperformance]

I would look at you battery cables and terminals then the alternator output as well as the batteries load level.

Just a note toys but only the 92-93 had the variable rear brake load adjuster hanging on them from 94 it was discontinued to a normal proportioning valve. Also in 97 the rear rotors were reduced to a smaller size on to what it on the Camry .