98es

Nice car... would have considered it a few months ago but picked up an '02 Camry SE. Good luck! Thats a good looking car!

hahaha you should have known that Steve was gonna jump all over that one :D

That is the ONE thing I wish my 05 had. Realistically, it's not that big of a deal, but I had it on my previous car ('95 Avalon) and miss it on this one. Can it be added on without tearing half the car apart? Or even at all? I've never even thought about asking the dealer about this. What I don't get about the MIST function is that I have it on my 2002 Camry... but not on the 98 or on my mom's 02 ES. I guess lexus thought that mist was 'beneath them'.

HAHA LOL sv7887- great post!!! 100% true! But of course... now the libs on the hill are calling for a special "windfall profits" tax on big oil. Considering how oil profit is an avg 9 cents a gallon and taxes are over 50 cents a gallon... who's got more room to talk?!?!?... Thank YOU senator kennedy... another great idea to screw the consumer.... i guess you've got to get that money somewhere to fund all of your entitlement programs (and I shall continue to own stock in jack daniels as long as the kennedy's have $).

I've noticed that lexus dealerships (at least the 2 i've been to) do 5,000 mile intervals with regular dino oil. I had to specially request for them to print the sticker out for 3,000 miles, but am only really a stickler about it on the '98 because of the threat of sludge.

Sorry to hear about that steve. I agree with steviej, obviously they're not too stable if they can't keep jobs in this bustling economy. Hopefully she won't have too much trouble finding another job. The job market for college grads is the best now than in the past 6+ years. Tell me how you get that? Unemployment=under 5% (lower than the clinton era), consumer & retail spending=all time highs, stock market=near record breaking highs, uncle sam=collecting more $ in taxes than ever. Ha hate to go off subject, i just think its funny how gloom and doom the media is on our economy when in reality it is BOOMING.

Congrats AMF!!!!!! How exciting! Report back and let us know all about it!

I don't know if any of you out there are boaters like me but I just found out yesterday that Toyota made boats for a few years in the late 90's early 00's. My best friend just bought one, a 2001 22' Toyota Wakeboarding boat!! Can you believe that!!?!? And here's the best part... it's powered by the LS400 V8! The reviews on it are outstanding, saying that the V8 is one of the quietest and most fuel efficient compared to all other marine V8's. Of course, I wouldn't expect any less from Toyota! Anyways, sorry for taking up space if some of you don't care about this, i just thought it was really cool. After all my many years on lakes i have NEVER seen a Toyota boat! Apparently they quit making them because they weren't very profitable. I guess you learn something new everyday!

lexusfreak- i was in dc last september and loved it! One thing I would try to do is tour the capitol building. Tickets are really cheap (maybe even free?) and its sooo cool inside there. If I were you I would also consider taking the metro up to Georgetown's campus. Its really pretty. Another suggestion I would make is to tour the Library of Congress, which is near the capitol bldg. It's beautiful in there. And I assume you will go the lincoln memorial as well, its right next to the vietnam veterans memorial. Here's a couple of pics. Sorry they're so big, i can't figure out how to make them smaller. Georgetown: Library of Congress: Capitol Rotunda (looking up)

mixd- same thing happened with our 02 es300. Dealer replaced the windshield when we bought it CPO because we noticed a chip on the OEM lexus windshield. Even if you would have gone to lexus, at least in my town, you still wouldn't have gotten a 'lexus' windshield. I know lexus of Memphis doesn't do their own windshield work, they contract it out. I know this because I had to go back to the dealership 3 times to get everything right. After 2 weeks of having the car the molding started coming up in the corner. The replacement windshield was an off-brand and the first time we were on the interstate a VERY small rock hit the windshield and chipped it! (I've had rocks 5 times bigger than that hit my oem windshield and not even leave a mark!) Then a week after that, molding started coming up again and the first hot day the rear view mirror fell off! So they sent the company they contracted to do it in the first place out to fix everything and replaced the windshield with the chip for free with a Pilkington, no chips at all since then. I'm anal about the windshield being OEM too, but in this case I was just happy to get it done right. My 98 ES300 still has the OEM windshield with 140k, and only one small chip (About 80% of the 140k are highway miles too!). IMO would definitely have to agree that these aftermarket windshields are not the same quality of the lexus ones.

Yes. Cool Springs. Took a little persuation but I think the end result was ok. I still don't think Lexus is trying quite as hard as they did in the early to mid 90's to win/retain customers. They're almost as complacent now as Merc & BMW were before Lexus appeared. I'd kinda have to agree... more so at some dealerships than others. Lexus does have their fair share of cocky service writers. I don't know if its because i'm younger than all of them or what, but it seems like the ones closer to my age (22) have a serious problem with being curteous with me. That's the main reason I refuse to go to Lexus of Memphis except for warranty work. After this spring i'll be moving from middle tn back to memphis, so I won't have a choice :(

This consumer reports stat is a little dated but I thought it was relavant.

I'd have to agree about the power difference from 98 to 99. I can't tell a difference whatsoever. My aunt has a 2000, and it seems the same to me. One plus for the 98 over the 97 is standard side airbags on the 98. I just had the valve cover gaskets replaced on my 98, and at ~ 140k miles, the engine still looks new on the inside, absolutely NO signs of sludge.

Not to get totally off topic here but has anyone ever seen Nissan's red??? Every now and then I'll see a red maxima and they are all the most awful dull, ugly looking cars because of nissans crappy paint. I'm on car #5 and can say that the lexus has the best pain job out of all of them. Maybe it's the 3 stage paint for the pearl, but even the paint on my 02 camry isn't that great. I went out of town for the day last weekend and some bird decided to drop a load down the side of my camry. Washed it off as soon as I saw it, but still have a permanent doodoo-print. Close inspection shows that the paint has a bunch of little cracks where the !Removed! was...

Very nice of them. Just curious, but was that Lexus of Nashville @ cool springs??? I really enjoy going there. MUCH better than lexus of memphis.

Yeah we just had a big stink in memphis about this type of thing not too long ago. Memphis is largely 'african american', so simple math would tell you that more 'african americans' will fail these tests than whites. Well, this somehow translated to them that these simple tests were racist because you cannot graduate until you pass them, and more blacks were failing than whites. IMO, if you can't pass these simple tests you need not only to be held back but possibly hit in the face (j/k). Unless, of course, you have some type of learning disability. I took these tests in high school, and they are mostly made up of middle school math, english, and reading comprehension. You have 4 years to pass them before you graduate, same test. Lenore- Couldn't agree more! As a senior in college, I've experienced attempted indoctrination more than you can imagine. I was even once in a political science class called a racist by the professor for defending the presidents school voucher program. I just hope its better by the time I have kids that are in school...

Not re-hash this old argument but after 5,000 miles on my falkens, i hate them now. I really liked them in the beginning, mostly for grip and not too much road noise. Now the grip sucks even on dry pavement and they are so dang loud. I guess the saying "you get what you pay for" ALWAYS rings true. The mxv4's on the es are still amazing with about 15k on them so far. But at least i'm not out too much $$$ with the falkens.

So I got my estimate and my check from safeco today. The good thing was I had my previous estimate from when the same thing happened a few months ago, so I was able to compare them. Safeco's estimate gives me a "reconditioned" bumper instead of a new one. I think the difference is something like $50. Do I have the power to tell them what kind of bumper I want? I don't wanna sound like a jerk but the bumper that their guy hit is a OEM NEW toyota bumper. I know its just $50 but still... I also noticed where he didn't add in something called "3 stage paint" which added another $75 in paint labor. He claimed he forgot, but would take care of it whenever I took it in to get fixed. I'm seriously thinking about just cleaning it up myself, and keeping the money though...

Haha nc i know what you mean. My fiance' went from driving her '92 mazda mx3 POS to my lexus too. You know what they say, once they get the seat molded to their butt you might as well kiss your car goodbye, its theirs now :) . I can't believe those cars are so cheap, but can you imagine how much it's gonna be worth when you go to sell it? If you can come to terms with that I'd say go for it. They are definitely unique cars! Good luck!

It's not something I've seen anywhere around here. The weird thing is I've seen many exclusive acura/honda shops but no toyota/lexus. I would go to one if it existed.

From what I understand you can buy green coolant that is safe for both red and green cooling systems. On the outside it says that its safe for both but the actual color is green. That's probably what they did.

Here's a couple of quick pics. I have a appt at the toyota body shop on Tuesday. His insurance co is safeco. Anyone know anything about safeco? Hopefully they're fair.

So here it is folks, my lexus' 3rd rear ending in 5 months!!!! UGH. Thank god it was just another bumper job, but this is really getting old. I'm thinking about just collecting the money and waiting for the next one to happen. I swear its not MY driving habits that are causing this!!!! Every single time I"m COMPLETELY stopped and had been for a little while. Anyways, this last time it was my fiance' who was driving. Some old Civic packed full with like 5 people, and it had been raining. He went up under the lexus and it really screwed his car up. I was going to maybe just try to buff it out and keep the money but it looks like one of the brackets that connects the bumper to the car under the trunk is broken. Maybe I can live with it, we'll see. Of course dude tried to tell my fiance, oh its not bad it all, just a couple of scratches, I think we're okay to just leave. HAHA. yeah right. Her reply was... THIS CAR IS MY FIANCE'S BABY! I HAVE TO CALL HIM! So thank god she got me (and thank god she's okay) and I told her to call the cops, and met her at the scene. Anyways, I'll post pics up later today when I get them. Here we go again!!!!

Thats awesome! honda knew what they were doing back then. I had a 5spd EX. Before i bought my camry about a month ago i was looking at the accord, but they were plagued with tranny problems!!! Toyota's got my vote, now that i've got 2 of them :)

She'll always have a special place in your heart :) My fiance would swear I need therapy because of the attatchment I have with my first car- 92 Accord. Sold it in 02 but still can't bear to see one driving down the road. :)