LEX-SV

rooket - The ISx250 is a solid choice. The differences in gas mileage between current generation and last generation is insignificant. Only EPA ratings model year 2008 on are reasonably accurate and comparable. I wouldn't be too concerned about what neighbors think, since it's your personal car. The current generation (model year 2008 on) Mercedes C-class is very reliable and more costly for routine maintenance. Do you currently have a 09 IS350? If so you will miss the 100 horsepower if changing to a IS250, even with the 10% difference in fuel economy.

Blame the penny? Good luck with that in court. Regardless, I find the wear bars to be more helpful in monitoring wear.

I saw couple of Rolls at supermarket/strip mall in Palm Desert, so I guess they can be used as daily drivers.

^ Welcome to LOC. How many miles on your IS250?

!Removed! green exterior might go well with horrid pistachio green interior seen on a few rare Porsches....

My wife likes a red car (called Mars red, it's fire engine red to me). Here is her daily driver Mars red Mercedes C300 next to my SGM IS350. And cops do notice this car too, her next car will probably be less bright in color.

Picked up my IS350 from Lexus dealership today (they had it overnight to do my VVT actuator recall and annual Mobil 1 synthetic oil change for $129). They returned it clean and with a full tank of gas, runs great. btw - I enjoyed have the new and loaded CT200 loaner (it had 13K miles on it) for 24 hours. Certainly nicer than the current gen Prius I drove a couple years ago for a week in Canada.

Paul - IMHO, black cars look great (as I'm sure your ES shiny does!), just challenging to maintain. I know some automakers (including Ford, BMW, Porsche) recently are pushing variations of brown, trying to make it flavor of the month or something, I'm just not digging it. And speaking of Porsche, the older SC and Carreras through '88 in brown tend to be lower priced and more difficult to sell. Becki - Good point about certain cars looking good in certain colors (or not). Normally I like white cars (like Mazda CX-5 in white mica metallic), I've owned too many to count. But white is poor color choice for early Porsche Boxsters, they end up looking like an old used bar of soap. Steve

I have more than one favorite (car) color, but I have a few personal guidelines: . The faster the car, the more conservative my color choice tends to be. . I absolutely refuse to own a plain silver car. Waaaaayyy too common around here. (I do like dark metallic silver gray/gunmetal kinds of colors) . No black cars, no brown cars for me. The article is a bit vague and amusing too.

I expect RC-F and RC350 to be plenty powerful and competitive in its class..

I have a loaner CT today, nicely finished, not very quick, firm ride/handling. Freeway cruising at 70-80 mph is relaxed.

Bridgestone Potenzas are known for noise and hard ride. Standard equipment due to low cost to the automaker(s). Do the tires have a lot of miles on them? Are they over 1/2 worn?

dave_k - Thanks for clarification, that makes more sense sticking with Lexus tire sizing per specs for 17" or 18" wheel as equipped. And if you stick with the tire sizing that Lexus specifies for the wheel, tire diameter will be nearly identical. Seems like a lot of money (to replace both wheels and tires) to get minimal impact on ride softness, especially if you are the one that has to pay for it (not the dealership). My suggestion is careful selection of tires (all season versus UHP summer tires). What tires are on the 18" wheels now? Notes: f 225/45/17 versus 225/40/18 r 245/45/17 versus 245/45/18

Yes, we know OPs primary concern is ride quality, I'm not convinced OP will tolerate large speedo error and significant deterioration in acceleration. Yes, the ES might be a better choice... Yes, but going up over 1" in tire diameter impacts too many things including acceleration. Not recommended going from 40 series to 50 series (as mentioned by OP in post #1), speedo error is significant, not to mention making 2.5L acceleration really sluggish. Yes, going from certain summer tires to certain all-seasons can make a big difference in ride comfort/softness and quietness. Example: (as done on Mercedes C300 with stock sizing) Hankook Ventus V12 (summer) vs the Continental DWS (all season). Changing brands is not the issue, changing specific tires is the bigger issue, even with identical sizing.

I would not recommend going to higher profile tire on the IS250. Speedo error and slower acceleration will be be significant on the modest horsepower IS. My preference would to go to the correct-sized comfort-oriented all season tire such as Continental ExtremeContact DWS. I've been running those on a Mercedes C300 for 13K+ miles with good comfort, low noise and little wear so far. This scenario is a lot cheaper than replacing both tires and wheels, and sizing will be correct for optimal performance.

Exactly why Lexus needs the additional SUV/crossover in its lineup (NX coming soon), this a huge high growth segment of the market in US. I drive something similar to NX (Mazda CX-5), and the extra 10-11 inches of roof height/seat height over a sport sedan or extra 12-15 inches over a sports car, gives extra visibility in traffic that is very significant. Also the chair height seating is comfy.

Yes, I'd like to see the evidence that nothing was done to later IS250's And before somebody states something like "service program only applies to early years since they are the ones with higher accumulated mileage", that is not evidence that nothing was done. And the major automakers (such as with Mazda Skyactiv DI gasoline engines) have made design changes to minimize this problem. So with latest version of DI engines being sold today the carbon issue is greatly reduced by design.

The F150 is the proven benchmark in that class of vehicle.

Yes, thanks. I looked earlier on Tire Rack and noticed the Toyo T1R's are back on the market (I originally thought they were being discontinued), anybody no about that maybe?. The T1R is Z-rated summer tire, so I'm looking for something competitive with that, the Hankook Ventus V12's are comparable for example.

I have Toyo T1R's on my Lexus IS350 that will be nearly worn out by end of year probably. Any recommendations for summer tires other than Hankook Ventus V12's?...

A lot of fleet sales in those numbers for April no doubt. Kinda boring list but great revenue producers. Of course the recovering economy is helping both consumer and fleet sales for April.

To some degree, yes. But I do the research and read multiple road tests and reviews and reach my own conclusions prior to any auto purchase. A vast majority of cars that I've purchased involved actual test drives, but I did point out a few exceptions above. And after the fact, I found the 4 vehicles noted performed exactly as I expected.

I always test drive before with a few rare exceptions involving 4 different cars. Guilty in these cases: 1. 1998 Porsche Boxster (purchased slightly used from a reputable dealership, still under factory warranty, 1st time driving a Boxster was drive home after buying it) 2. 2004 Porsche Boxster S (purchased new, traded-in the 98 Porsche Boxster, 1st drive in this car was driving it home after buying) No surprises, these 2 Porsches drove exactly as I expected. 3. 2002 Toyota Highlander Ltd. - test drove another one a couple weeks before I bought this new one. 4. 2013 Mazda CX-5 GT - test drove another Touring version a week before I bought this new one.

Question: Does Lexus sell a F-Sport exhaust for the lastest gen GS350? I'm running a F-sport exhaust on my IS350, the sound is really good with these 3.5L V6's (not shown in my picture below which was taken before installation).

Welcome to our new moderators in new roles. Good to see LOC moving ahead.