dreamchaserflorida

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.

re: availability. I "walked in" May 19 and bought one on the lot. My daughter did the same thing the day before and we both had very generous incentives given to us. This dealer does not charge any premium nor any dealer's fee. I noticed that the dealer started advertising for the first time a week ago for the Hybrid RX 400h so I assume that there is a large inventory there. The dealership is Scanlon Lexus, Ft. Myers, Florida. By comparison, the Naples, Florida dealership charges a dealer's fee and add-ons. The Naples dealer often charges big premiums, too, so I would never do business with them. It is my impression that there is good availability in SW Florida where I live.

thanks to katzj for the email address of ny Times... I just wrote a message. I hope other owners write them, also. ============= To: nytnews@nytimes.com <nytnews@nytimes.com> A message to the general Editor and to the Letters to the Editor section. RE:

Thanks for letting us know. I'm anxious to get it registered. What are the features of the owners area? Anything besides just your car info? B) ← Today, July 16, 2005, I succeeded in registering my VIN on RX 400h... I had tried several times in the past two months but was given error messages. Then, I discovered the ClubLexus Forums which I did not know existed in addition to the Lexus.com Owners site.. I surf online a lot. The Lexus web site is full of quirks and poor programming. It is frustrating and sometimes, I never do get to the "page" I need. This is a poor sign for an expensive auto company. I hava cable modem and always have a fast connection with other sites but the Lexus.com site sometimes is very slow or never connects to links or sub-pages. The Edmunds Forums on the RX 400h are superior to the Lexus.com site Forums in terms of use.

In most of the hybrid Forums, people who try to sell their place on WaitLists are not viewed positively. I suppose there might be a few Buyers who might bid on this but to me, the offer is in very poor taste generated by greed IF the offer is for monetary reimbursement. It is worse than a dealership's premium add-on procedure to take advantage of the market. I still am high on a Highlander Hybrid waitlist with a $500 deposit but would not try to "sell" my place even though I probably will not use it. My situation has changed since I now have the Lexus RX 400h. If I decide to not buy another hybrid such as the HH, I will get off the HH WaitList to give the next person in line a chance to buy.

Thats not true, the Prius will not run if its out of gas either. ← FAQ from Toyota.com : "Though Prius can operate in electric-only mode when gasoline is in the tank, it is not designed to run without gasoline. DOING SO could cause severe damage to the hybrid system, so drivers should be sure to keep gas in the tank at all times." This is the info from Toyota. The Prius is not designed to run without gasoline and will be damaged if a driver drives without gasoline in the tank. What has happened is that a few drivers have been forced (their decision/impression) to drive after running out of gas such as in a time of great need to move the car to get help. These drivers have reported this fact to Prius forums and replies were received from readers that these drivers should not have driven without gas because the (main) battery was probably ruined. The Prius WILL run on electricity alone if there is no gas in the tank. However, Toyota states that "DOING SO so could cause severe damage". So, it should not be done. My guess is that Lexus made the RX 400h to be not capable of drivng without gas in the tank so that no damage can occur to that SUV. If a driver insists on trying to start the RX 400 h without gas, it will become inoperable at the third attempt.

More accurate fuel economy numbers will start showing up after your first oil change at 5,000+ miles at least. The engine is still getting 'broken in' dude (all brand new cars have higher fuel consumption because of this, hybrid or not) & for some reason I feel that you have set your expectations so high that you are your own worst enemy because of it. Be a bit more patient on this & relax!........and start to enjoy your new ride more, she is a beautiful piece of machinery. ← Patience is virtue. My daughter has 1,200 miles now on her RX 400h... including about a 250 miles highway trip. She reports approx 26 mpg without special approaches in driving. I still only have 200 miles on mine in the two weeks I have had the car so the 23 mpg I have had is a moot report. If I had wanted better fuel consumption as offered by a cheaper, smaller, less powerful hybrid, then I would drive a Prius... if I wanted a luxury class SUV hybrid like the RX 400h, I would get that and forfeit better fuel consumption. I made this decision. I don't regret selling my Prius although I really liked it a lot...but the RX 400h offers me so much more in terms of higher quality and increased number of features. It is sooooo comfortable and such a pleasure to drive.... now, if only I could learn soon all the nuances of the complex technology of the Lexus..... I would enjoy it more.

-------------------------- Actually, Prius Forums often report on special driving styles which raise the mpg. Owners describe their driving technique efforts for better fuel consumption. They are attempting to use the battery more (sometimes call "stealth mode" at certain speeds or in parked status) and the gas engine less so reports are of anticipating a stop, coasting, lower speeds, cruise control use, avoidance of "stomping on the gas", etc. etc. The same techniques should apply to the 400h although the 400h is less fuel-efficient due to size, power and design. Yes, the Prius has better city fuel economy than the Lexus... it is a different car than the 400h. This is not puzzling. However, it is puzzling about the few Lexus owners' reports of higher highway mpg as compared to city driving. This seems against the technological design.

[just puch the voice command button on your steering wheel and say some thing along the lines of "gas station" or "POI on" (in the exact samw words) works in my GX >>Where can I get a list of voice commands for the navigation system? I printed some lists which were available on Prius sites: Look for the file called “Prius NAV Voice commands.xls” in the Files section of the Yahoo group: http://autos.groups.yahoo.com/group/2004-prius/files/ . PriusChat files has an edited version of the above.... grouped commands by function. I think I prefer this but I had already printed the first list mentioned above. Many of the navigation systems are manufactured by DENSO : http://www.denso.com.au/dw/satnav/satnav_gen.htm DENSO is an OEM supplier to Ford, Toyota, Lexus, and Jaguar in the Australian market (and also in North America... different company names are used?) I also printed the "How To..." pages in the Lexus RX 400h CD. I will put them in the car for use. I also burned a CD copy of the Lexus.exe program and media/welcome file to use in the car's CD player (supposedly I can play the audio of the Lexus CD). I wanted to put the original CD in a "safe" place in the house and use the copy in the car. Due to size, I had to burn two CDs.

We have not driven our RX 400h more than 200 miles so we do not have any realistic data to look at for fuel consumption. We only have used it for very short city drives such as grocery shopping while always using the A/C. We have gotten a little over 23 mpg so far. However, I do not feel that this is the time to look at fuel consumption considering the many times we have run the car in Park while waiting for someone or that there were other times of poor conditions for higher mpg. So, we won't be in a rush to "fill up". However, I am curious to check the mpg after the first fill up and also after a certain "break in" time. I will ask my daughter about her mpg in her new RX 400h since she drives it more in the city and just returned from a highway journey of about 250 miles. However, she has only had her car for about ten days (like me) so I don't expect any data which is meaningful because it is too early. We had guessed that we might get about 28 mpg in this car because we knew that the EPA ratings are usually higher than what is realistic. If we had wanted better fuel consumption, we would have bought a less powerful and heavy hybrid car. It is going to be interesting to see "the numbers" on the hybrid Highlander when it is available in June. I don't look at the numbers on the Escape Hybrid because it is not really comparable to the Lexus RX 400h. Yes, I will be disappointed if my mpg is much less than, say, 27 - 28 mpg but right now, I will be patient.... it is just too early to know how efficient my car will be.

<<<Is there any way to only retrieve thread messages posted after a certain date? It would help immensely if I could search for messages, new topics and specific topics which have been posted after the last date I reviewed them.>>>> Here is a reply from Mathew re: searching for messages: The "Member Bar" - near the top, in the right hand corner has several tools that can help. You can click on "My Controls" - and you will be shown the last five topics you posted / read. You can also click on your own name - and find all the threads and posts you have ever made. You can click on "Search" - and find threads on any keywords you choose. You can also subscribe to a thread or topic - and be sent emails when new posts or topics are created.

>>>>

[quote=SW03ES Different Forum....>>>> I am frustrated trying to find specific info on the RX 400h. Here is a copy of a message I just sent to Mathew... an administrator for the ownersclub... could you help me search more efficiently? The topic list is extremely long and will get longer quickly. I think that in a very short time, the Forum/subforum list for specific 400h info will be unmanagable. Hi. First of all, thank you for all your efforts in our behalf. I am spending a great deal of time trying to find info specifically for the RX 400h. this is more of a problem in the Lexus Forum site than in any other similar web site. I just registered and in the beginning, I could not find a forum for the 400h. I thought, perhaps, it was because the car was new... but, then, I went through each of the forums and found it listed with other cars ... it was difficult to find the 400h so I almost decided to stay with the other Forums which were easier to use. I replied regarding a question if a new separate Forum for the 400h should be made... YES ! I was informed that I had voted already but, aside from my opinion in a message, I have not officially gone through a voting submission. I did; however, see the poll results. Is there a problem with the poll voting protocol? I know that if I scroll through a large number of threads, I can find a topic but that takes time. this is a cumbersome procedure. Is there any way to only retrieve thread messages posted after a certain date? It would help immensely if I could search for messages, new topics and specific topics which have been posted after the last date I reviewed them. I am very happy with the 400h SUV and would like to review and reply to messages in a more efficient manner.

My salesman said that the 400h will not run if it runs out of gas. Once more gas is put in the tank, it should start fairly easily. However, if the driver tries continuously to start the engine, say more than 3 times, when there is no gas, there is a type of disabling which occurs and the car will be much more difficult to start. This is my understanding and I don't pretend to be an expert on this. This is different from the Prius. If you run out of gas, you can force the car to run on battery alone but this ruins the battery which would be disastrous. So, I suppose the rule with all hybrids is to never run out of gas.

Hello to everyone. I just bought a 2006 RX400h two days ago and my daughter bought a 2006 RX400h three days ago. I will post our experiences regarding availability on another thread. Regarding fuel consumption of the RX400h, it is too early for either of us to know what that will be. However, as a Prius 2004 owner, I have participated in Prius message boards for several years and the Hybrid Highlander message boards (I have been on a WaitList for HH for several months). In the Prius forums, it is acknowledged that the EPA rating procedures for hybrids are faulty and the mpg ratings are usually not extremely accurate. The 51 - 60 mpg range likely will not be reached. Our Toyota dealership salesman pointed this out when we bought but we already knew this. We usually got 47 - 50 mpg in the city but we run the A/C most of the time a lot of each year because we live in very sunny and hot SW Florida and this reduces the mpg. Also, we have used the Prius in a small city doing short term errands and this reduces mpg. We all know that driver styles affect the fuel consumption greatly. Personally, we are not the "stomp on the gas pedal and speeder" types so this helped us get better mpg. Even so, we did not reach the better fuel consumption levels of Prius owners who were very diligent in their efforts to attain high mpg levels. We live in a flat terrain area so our consumption differed from others in hilly or mountainous regions. I don't know that this is true but I have the idea that drivers in the cold winter areas get slightly worse mpg than those of us in the humid and hot areas. Significant factors in mpg are the size, weight and performance of the hybrids and I recognized that the 400h would have slightly poorer reports than other hybrid SUVs especially those like the Ford Hybrid Escape which is smaller, lighter and less powerful. Even so, I wanted the RX400h after I saw it and test-drove it. I imagine that we will get close to 26 - 28 mpg in the RX400h after the "break-in" considering many factors and I expect very slightly better reports with the Hybrid Highlander if we buy one later for another family member. Even if we don't get 26 - 28 mpg in the RX400h in city driving, I think that the positive difference in quality, comfort, safety, appearance, and noise abatement as offered by the RX400h was the essential reason for choosing it over any existing comparable hybrid SUVs. I doubt that we will ever buy anything other than a hybrid tech car in the future based on our satisfaction with the Prius and. hopefully, with the RX400h. dreamchaserflorida, A. B. (A Blonde)