What To Do?

Okii · June 28, 2014

I just inherited a well maintained 1999 gs300 with 36k miles. First thing I noticed is that the brakes on the lexus are not that good. Can these be improved? Also, I've seen online where people have swapped the engine for a twin turbo engine from Japan or a turbo supra engine. I live in CA. Is it legal to do this in CA? If not, does supercharging improve performance enough to warrant the cost? If not, what else can be done? Thanks.

PS: is this car a second generation GS?

13IS250C · June 28, 2014

Welcome to LOC Greg.

I would hate to see you start modding a car with that low mileage. Seems like it would be worth a lot of money like it is and if you start modding, it would lose value. I guess a lot of that depends on how long you want to keep it.

I put a supercharger on my 95 Z28. I'll tell ya, it made a lot of difference and I loved the whistle it made. Of course, it killed my gas mileage...you have to remember that too.

I don't know the CA state laws. We have some CA fellas here that might be able to answer that.

Okii · June 29, 2014

Thanks. Something to definitely consider. As far as the braking, does this car have disc brakes front and rear? Is there anything that can be done to improve the braking performance that's not a drastic modification?

Thanks

1990LS400 · June 29, 2014

The brakes on a 99 GS300 should have excellent stopping power - like throwing out a boat anchor.

My suspicion is that the car was not as well maintained as you think it was. Even at its low odometer reading, the brake fluid should have been replaced at least five times since the car was new - every three years or 30,000 miles, whichever comes first.

And perhaps the brake discs are rusted or the calipers are not functioning properly. Ultra low miles on an older car is not necessarily a good thing.

My suggestions is that you treat the car as if it has 90,000 miles on it and do the full 90,000 mile service including changing the water pump, timing belt, idlers, tensioner and ancillary parts.

How old are the tires? Replace them if they are older than six years even if they look good and have lots of tread left. You should be able to identify the tire ages by codes on the tire sidewalls but if they are the original tires they may be too old to have the currently used code system. If you don't know the coding system, you can find it on www.tirerack.com .