blake918

Congrats...what a great car!! I like the auto magazine pose you setup with your two cars. Enjoy her for several, several more years as ~156k miles is nothing on a LS. ;) What kind of maping software do you have on that little HP (if my eyes aren't decieving me!)?

I was in Houston when this letter arrived not to mention the mail was extraordinarily slow getting it to the house, so here we go..... Josh called through out the week of his graduation. Everything went well, and he is now working on his secondary training (for the lack of the proper acronym!). I wish him continued success and all of the best!

I don't know if my eyes are decieving me, but those seats just don't look right. It looks like they were recovered, but the seat cover pattern wasn't duplicated properly? They look really small too.

I had a Chinese(exchange student from a small town outside of Harbin) room-mate last year, and I questioned him a lot about what cars they have over there. He said Toyota, Honda, etc. are not very popular because he said they just don't like the Japanese. He was shocked to see all of the Toyotas and Hondas here in the US. He was very familiar with VW, MB, BMW, Buick, and Lincoln because those are the most popular makes on the roads there. He said a lot of officials have Lincolns; I showed him a picture of a Town Car, but he didn't recognize it. That Crown looks great, and I'm so jealous of those power folding mirrors on that beige 95-97 LS!! :D

I threw it away. You wouldn't of had a use for it anyway, it was a nightmare. I only changed my driver's seat since all of the others are in fine shape. Where is your seat worn? Is it that large section nearest the B pillar? Did you try car-part.com? That's where I found my replacement. It's hard to believe I bought this for $300....

Sure is!.....

Some common problems include....upper and lower control arms, lower ball joints, strut rods, power steering leakage (either at the rack or pump. depending on which location, you can add in an alternators too.), hood support struts, stereo lcd, seatbelts that don't retract, ECU, some cd changer failures, cracked(rocks) headlight lens, P-->D transmission lurch, oil leaks/oozes at cam, crank, and valve seals. Definantly get the '95 LS over the '94 ES!! ;)

Michelin MXV4+ Energy tires are the only tires for this car! They are excellent and wet and dry weather, and I've yet to have a balance, alignment, and/or uneven wear problem. I have 45k+ miles on these tires, and they look like new. I'm definantly buying them again when it's time.

Probably not since a 99's front seat has a side air bag. It would probably bolt up, but I don't know about the connectors.

I'm not sure where you can buy just the LCD. I sent mine to Mikado, and they put a new lcd in and put new back lighting in for $150+shipping. Be extremely careful pulling the a/c vents because they are very, very frail and easy to break.

Hmmm........I can't understand this statement since 'Consumers Reports' and other Cellphone emags always gives Verizon top marks for all around service. ← No offense, but I don't care what Consumer Reports says or anyone else for that matter, VZW sucks in Louisiana, Texas, Alabama, Florida, and Mississippi. I've never dropped more calls and spent more on roaming in all of my life...not to mention their shoddy business practices and esn blacklists. I should have gone with Cingular. :chairshot:

Hedge, does your lcd look like this? If so, you'll need to have the lcd replaced. The removal instructions for a 95-97 will be very, very similar for a '98-'00. ;)

Me too!! That's why I dumped my LG VX6100 for an old school Nokia 3285 hard mounted in my LS400 with the Nokia CARK 91H. Speakerphone is great! Sadly, I have Verizon service. I've never dealt with poorer cell service

I have MXV4+'s on my LS, and they handle very well through wet hurricane seasons. I've driven through standing water, and the tires handle fine. We had a bit of snow around Christmas. I was disappointed with the way they handled, but I don't have trac/vsc, and I hear that LS snow performance is highly dependant on good winter tires+traction/stability. Steve, you made an excellent choice! I have over 40k miles on my Michelins, and they look brand new. DC is right when he says they wear like steel! Mine wear/align/balance perfectly...never any problems other than my running over nails. lol I'm upset that they are not going to be making them any more. :cries:

Great points! ;) I'm glad you are smart enough to catch the meaning of the little movie; suprisingly, it went right past a lot of people, and the thread has been jacked for that reason. You summed it up beautifully, Chris! ;)

It's not easy to use and very distracting. I test drove a 745i for a friend, and after only 30min, I wanted to firebomb the car. It drove wonderfully, was reasonably comfortable, and is very fast, but not knowing how to quickly pick-up on the controls of the car gives it a very poor rating in my book. I wouldn't mind the 745 if they made it w/o idrive. I'm glad to say that the editors of Car and Driver stand by my remarks of distaste towards iDrive. The super car 530i came in 6 out of 8 in their May '05 competiton beating out the ancient Jag S type and Caddy STS. Not suprisingly, one of the things about the car in the "lows" was iDrive...go figure that one! lol Perosnally, I'd be pretty suprised if it did since the new GS and IS have lots and lots of buttons!

No prob! The '98 is a sweet car; it'd be cool to have a 745 and LS! I'm not being a hatin dog! I like BMWs(at least the 6 and 7 series. x5 and z4 aren't bad either), but I'm a little upset that they all have iDrive which is an unquestionably distracting and unintuitive device. The 8 does sound weird when it starts-up to me-no big deal at all! I do stand by 0-62 being slow for a V12 powered vehicle....a CL65 AMG would blow the doors off a M8(couldn't resist...I'm a MB lover!). It's just my $.02, no hard feelings I hope!

LOL That old 8 series deserves a yawn also. A big V12 that only yields a 0-62 of 6.0...eek! :o Not vroom, vroom in my book. I was impressed with the little coin trick, but then, he started it and it sounded like a screaming cat. lol :D I have driven a '05 LS430, and it's not remarkably smoother than my 400. Certainly, it's more powerful than my LS400, but I don't use the power. I can count the number of times I've gone WOT in my LS between my two hands. I would only trade up because of the smart access and vented seats (maybe the led tails also); the improvements in ride quality, quietness, and smoothness are inconsequentially similar to the LS400 to me. I can live without the damnable drive by wire lag also. It drove me nuts while I was driving the car. I don't care about the lack of additional gears (unless it had a real OD like some GMs)...the LS430 has lower epa mileage than my LS400. Sha, your LS and 01-03 LS430 are the same in 0-60: 6.3 sec.

That is insane. Click on the link I posted ($470 for 1 OEM air strut is a great price), spend a few hours installing it, and save over$1k. ;)

It won't be too, too bad if you have to foot the repair. One shock is $470 at Park Place Lexus: http://www.trademotion.com/partlocator/ind...993&catalogid=1 It seems like you would be able to keep driving on it until it get so low that it rubs. <_<

That's the LS. ;) My ES is much, much slower!

Thanks, Chris! She has 257k miles now and is still a wonderful car(a little small for someone my height, but a wonderful car no less.).

That car is really not that bad. It's wrinkled and worn, but I've seen much, much worse. The black stuff is probably dirt/oil build up/etc. which is easily removed with a Magic Eraser and 1 minute of time. A used car with leather problems is the best kind to buy because they are retardedly easy to fix either by any upholstry shop or buying a seat from a junker, and it's a good bargining point.

Is a black '95 LS's windshield grey or green?

I haven't heard of the backlighting failing, but the stereo LCD on the 95-00 failing is not uncommon. When I had my LCD replaced, they put new backlighting in too!