stiksandstones

quick skim through this thread I saw a lot of wacko info on premature wear due to hybrid system and other nonsense....I am here looking to see what size I need as my wife has the car and the wheel is still at tire shop, but I just got back from tire shop with her wheel that can not be fixed, the michelin got a chunk of wood splinter in sidewall, can not be patched-so I need new tires.

She got her rx400 the second they landed in america, she has 39k miles and I would say the michelins have about half tread left-all even wear too, so, with this tire that can not be fixed-got to get new ones. I see they are michelin mxv 235/55/18, so off to order some more.

Amazing car, great tires....and this coming from a huge whiner and product complainer.

we are at about 15,400 on ours, bought june of last year.

I echo the original posters comments about mileage, costs...

We love ours, I have to say my favorite feature is the acceleration, it really is SO much better than our 330 we used to have.

The fact we sent a message to govt. and auto industry by buying a hybrid also feels good.

My main issue is, if the BT is connected and I answer a call from the phone-like, if I want to talk in private NOT on cars bluetooth, car overrides it and you can hear conversation on cars speakers-this is not good with clients in car, listening to conversation...so I just dont use BT anymore.....plus the battery life is awful on this phone with BT.

Yeah, this can be a problem if you want to talk in private. It's just the way BT was set up and flows from the notion that this would normally be a earbud picking up the phone call, not a speaker phone.

One way around this and to have more control over the BT operation is to make a shortcut on you main menu that goes to turning the BT on/off. Maybe even dedicating one of your hardware buttons to the task (this assumes you phone can be customized this way, all 3 of my Motorola phones have had this abilty).

That way you can easily turn BT on if you want to use the car's hands free feature, and otherwise leave it off for privacy and batt life.

Hope this helps.

Ya, but I do not think its a BT feature, my crappy LG sprint BT phone would go to phone only operation when I answered a call from phone, when I do this on the samsung, it does not matter-as long as BT is enabled it will always come through car speakers.

I've got a 400h and a Razr, and have the same call waiting and "lag when dialing from handset" problems... plus one more!!

If I terminate a call with my cell phone instead of the Lexus buttons, then every call I make from that point on in my drive gets dropped after a few seconds and the Lexus says the call was dropped by the network. The only remedy? I have to turn off my car at a stoplight and restart it, then the phone works fine.

Glitchy, Glitchy!!

rx400h and sprint samsung a900 phone here, just sucks.

We had a sprint LG crappy bluetooth phone, as it was only BT option at time, worked great, but was a horrible phone, when the 10million dollar samsung phone came out, we got one-it does not work well with our car.

My main issue is, if the BT is connected and I answer a call from the phone-like, if I want to talk in private NOT on cars bluetooth, car overrides it and you can hear conversation on cars speakers-this is not good with clients in car, listening to conversation...so I just dont use BT anymore.....plus the battery life is awful on this phone with BT.

They replaced your car with a new one? wow, that's great!

If you ever hear what the problem with your original one was, let us know :)

Yes, let us know.

We just hit 20k on our 400h, loved every minute of it.

Here is another page that may help answer your questions regarding Hybrid tax deductions/credits...

http://www.hybridcars.com/tax-deductions-credits.html

Also, some good state-specific info can be found here...

http://go.ucsusa.org/hybridcenter/incentives.cfm

...great links - thanks! It looks like I get a $2200 federal tax credit.

We got our 400h in summer of 05'

reading those links criteria says must be purchased on or after jan 1 2006-so we do not get the credit?

Does anyone have the C-Best settings list for the RX400h ?

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go to lexus.com or use this link :

http://lexus2.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/lexus2....ated=1119453544

a pdf file... print only page 2 to save ink. I will have this done tomorrow. I think there is a form in my glove compartment but have printed the form anyway.

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Never even heard of this-cbest-but I would love to not have the doors lock-Hate it. Who does these settings? dealer?

We have owned our 400h for 1 month with no complaints. Except, we noticed that the air conditioning was only blowing cold air on the passenger side of the vehicle.  When I took it to the service department they informed me (a couple of days later) that there was a manufactoring defect on the hoses for the AC.  This defect allows for the AC to be blocked on the drivers side.

The service rep informed me that this has happened on at least 4 other vehicles thus far and the part has to come from Japan, which could take up to 2 weeks.  Has anyone else experienced this problem?

I ahve a loaner but feel kind of jipped b/c I am still making payments on the out of service vehicle.  Any suggestions?

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9 weeks here and 6500 miles-no problems whatsoever. We even have chrome lexus wheels that the scammers at the dealership put on-but no mechanical problems. we LOVE the car.

I had the homelink working fine on my rx300 and my Genie garage doors, was opening main garage and 3rd car...now for the life of me I can not get the rx400 homelink to work.

I have tried the regular setup, rolling setup, canadian setup-nada.

Any tips or tricks for me, tired of having my wife park outside because the garage isnt open.

I even read that some genie openers max out their memory of codes, so reset my opener unit-had to reprogram my little handheld clicker...started from ground zero, still doesnt work. :cries:

We are on sprint and I am using a treo 650 with the rx400, and I had to get my wife a BT phone with sprint and my choice was this horrible LG little phone, its total crap, but works with her when driving and thats all I cared about.

I have sirius at home and in my truck, not in the 400 yet though. It is well worth the money-enough said.

First thing in the morning when I back out of the garage, the brakes on my 400h squeak 2-3 times.  Then I never hear it again until the next "cold boot".  Anyone else having that problem?

Just realized, thanks to a little birdie, that I  spelled brakes wrong in the subject line.

:whistles:

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we are in so cal and every morning I hear my wife back out of garage I can hear the squeal...she has 1000 miles on the 400. The car pulls to the right bad too, taking it in friday because we have the day off...see what they say about a new 50,000$ car with squealing brakes.

My wifes 400 was $50,800 (I think...I dont have sticker in front of me)-savannah gold. Our so cal dealer did put chrome wheels on it for a huge upcharge, she hated the wheels but they would not remove them-she bought anyway.

At the time of pick up, they were putting on some HIDEOUS step up tubes, I would call them running boards but they looked to be off a chevy monster truck, we begged to keep those off, after begging for 10 minutes they said ok, but the wheels gotta stay. They were also trying to add on the lojack, but we were walking out and they said "ok, just the wheels then"

All this to get the markup without adding markup...my wife was kinda *BLEEP*ed, but has wanted this car since news of its release and its her hard earned cash so choice was hers.

I am going to try and get money back now after news of the NO CUSTOM wheels email from corporate.

Anyway, we love the car...mileage is MUCH better than our 99 rx300 and more powerful and other cool stuff....sure we paid a premium, but I think buying the Hybrid is more about making a statement than anything else-telling our govt that we are willing to look at change.

over and out

dealer put chrome lexus wheels on my wife's 400 and added the scam markup...she doesn't even like them, how legit is this letter? and can we use this as ammo to get stock wheels back on? (shes had the car 4 a week and half)

I call out while driving from my treo, the lexus then takes over once the call is connected.

been receiving and calling on my treo 650 bluetooth for 3 days now in our rx400...while driving too

03/05 on ours...so cal rx400

We are noticing some different braking as well, not bad, just different.

Takes some getting used to, but I do like the braking.

Ours now has 335 miles on it. Have not seen the fully charged battery, but not concerned. Just filled up the tank with 13.78 gallons and did that 335 on it (picked up from dealer with 2 miles) so I think it was like 25mpg. Thats with about 160 miles of fast freeway driving (65-80mph) and then local 'round town driving.

Pretty impressed with this car (its my wifes) but I am concerned with one hybrid aspect....when the gas motor comes on and off as needed....through our lives we always here that starting a traditional motor is the hardest thing on a car, well I notice this rx400's gas motor starts up and stops A LOT, how is this going to be for engine life?.

Anyways, so far love the ride and speed of the car. Oh yeah, wife wanted to buy herself some custom wheels (20") I tried talkin her out of it but she had the money burning a whole in her pocket...so she finds the wheels she has to have but the guy said they are special order from Japan and will take 2 months! haha, I WIN!

But like I said in another thread, I dont wanna take a chance with messing with the wheel circumference.

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And I did one with our car lowered....

imo go with 22's...they'll fill up the wheel well nicely...

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22's would surely look great, as the lexus has huge wheel wells. But I am very afraid to mess with the dynamics of the car. The fact that the braking, etc...is an integral part of the hybrid car I am afraid to try anything-and I wonder if it will void any warranties. I assume there was no testing on a hybrid lexus with 20's or 22's!! haha Sure wish there was a lexus engineer on this forum that could tell us yes or no on changing the wheels.

Driving this 400h sure is different, the electric portion is not on as much as I expected, meaning the gas motor drives the car more than I expected. you have to GENTLY touch gas pedal for it to drive solely on elec power.

I DL some wheels I would like, some 20's and photoshopped them in on our savannah 400h....looks awesome, but still I am afraid to change wheels.

Do not like the stock rims, they look small on the car. BUT, we are very afraid to put different wheels on this type of car. As I can assume the car was completely tested and designed around the 235-55-18 tire (i think). Does anyone have any comments on changing the stock wheels to a 19 or 20" on the Hybrid 400?

dealer came through, just got home with wifes new 400h....pretty cool so far, but the mileage on the highway was not so good...motor runs different....I am updating my treo so the bluetooth can work now, more to come once I get some sleep.

I will ad this...our dealer was one that did not have paid waiting lists, I actually dont know how they worked it, but wife called last summer and told the guy she wanted a car...when we showed up it had tons of options on it, some horrible metal tube running boards, lojack, custom wheels, undercarriage crap, etc...sticker was 50,820, but with all the crap on it came to 58k....wife told they guy that was BS and we were leaving. To make a long story short they took everything off and got the sticker back down to sticker.

Anyway, more to come

If anyone in socal is on a list that wants to forfeit their name to me ;-) I would appreciate this.

stiksandstonesATgmail.com

thanks

interesting, we put 18" CSC wheels on my wifes 99' rx300 and rear wheels use spacers, front do not. Front wheels rub inside of wheel well when turned all the way....rides better though but I think it jacks with the odometer.