1990LS400

Like I said earlier, it's nice to have OEM wheels in case you ever destroy one. I would feel a little better about the aftermarket wheels I bought from Tirerack with my snow tires if I had thought to buy an extra wheel. I haven't trashed a wheel yet (but my wife has on her Camry) and my CPA wife tells me that I'm keeping this LS for another 7 years. "Closeout" means that they are depleting their inventory for the season and don't plan to restock or that the tire model has been discontinued. I've bought a lot of closeout tires from Tirerack over the years when prices have been right. I tend to plan ahead and have purchased as many as 12 tires at a time when prices have been particularly good. You have to be careful about tire aging but it's less of a problem if you store unused new tires in a dark, climate control environment. Probably any heavy duty snow tire with the mountain/snowflake symbol on the sidewall would be just fine for you. The ones labeled "ice and snow" usually have the mountain snowflake symbol on the side wall and provide better traction that "performance winter" tires.

Ooo, where do you get one of these? Is there a variant for a TomTom? How heavy does this thing weigh (just the bag thing). Google's a wonderful resourse: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=t...;oq=tomtom+bean

Metal debri is normal and may not mean anything at all. I was disgusted when one of my brother-in-laws told me a couple of years ago that, as a manager of a well known franchised transmission shop, he had to meet a transmission rebuild quota every single week. It didn't matter if a transmission needed to be rebuilt -- he had to rebuild a certain amount of transmissions every single week to keep his job.

Tire Rack ships to Canada ( http://www.tirerack.com/about/using.jsp ) but I'm not up on the what the customs duty would be. Maybe its time for a little jaunt to the U.S. to pick up tires and wheels -- do you have friends or relatives in the U.S. near the border you could have Tire Rack ship tires and wheels to? Not to encourage illegal behavior, but my Ontario cousins don't get seem to get hassled or be required to pay import duties on excess purchases when bringing stuff in from the U.S. My wife, cousins and I were pretty much just just waved through the border crossing when we drove into Ontario near Detroit last June 27th -- just flashed our passports and that was it. But maybe they thought us five geezers weren't troublemakers.

Tire Rack has some inexpensive 17" wheels for the 400h in stock for US$115 and Blizzak DM-Z3 in 225/65R17 for US$106. I bought the "snow wheels" for my current LS from Tire Rack. However, a problem with buying aftermarket wheels is that, after a few years, it can be impossible to find a replacement if you ever accidentally trash a wheel. Steel wheels would be fine if you can find some that will fit. You might be able to find used Lexus wheels on Craiglist and it is possible that wheels from a Toyota would fit. I bought extra wheels for my first Lexus from a Lexus dealer in 1990 when I bought the car -- they were "take-offs" and were inexpensive at the time. I found a few issues with switching from summer to winter tires on the same set of wheels year after year -- I did this on a Mercedes I had for 10 years. For one, the tire beads can get damaged -- maybe not a big issue if you drive a lot of miles (excuse me ... kilometers) in the winter if your snow tires are going to last only a couple of years. Secondly, if you have allow wheels, they can get pretty banged up in a twice-a-year switchover process. The cost of buying an extra set of wheels if really pretty low if you can amortize the cost over a number of years -- easy for us since we usually keep cars for over ten years. And when it comes to selling a car (we almost never trade in cars) having snow tires on extra wheels is certainly a plus to buyers. Another thing I like about having extra wheels is that I can do the changeover myself on my own schedule -- takes me no more than 30 minutes. Down here, I can wait until mid-November to install snow tires and usually remove them the first day of Spring if I'm not going to be driving north. I've had to slap the snow tires back on once or twice over the past few decades when there has been a Spring snow storm.

Here is what I found when I searched for "Blizzak": http://us.lexusownersclub.com/forums/index...lite=%2BBlizzak

That is an excellent way to sum it up. Perhaps more important than getting your car moving is the ability to stop it. It doesn't matter if your car has 4WD, AWD, or ABS if your tires can't bite into the snow/ice when you step on the brake pedal. OK, I've said it before on this forum... I absolutely love my Blizzaks. I've got the heavy duty WS50 "ice and snow" Blizzaks which have been superseded by the WS60. This is the fifth winter on my Blizzaks and they are still not worn down to the winter wear bars. After 23,000 miles (I keep track), the Blizzaks are are still not much noisier than my directional summer (not all-season) tires and they haven't required rebalancing a single time.

There is a fairly lengthy procedure described in my 00 LS400 repair manuals for testing the switches and the seat heaters by testing for continuity on the various connectors. It's a little lengthy to try to scan and post here and it might not even match your SC. Maybe you could ask your Lexus dealer to print the diagnostic pages from techinfo. As complicated as the diagnostic procedure is, I'd bet that it would take a Lexus mechanic less than 30 minutes to determine the problem.

I've seen owners of older GX cars ask the Bluetooth question many times on Lexus forums and have never seen anyone come up with a method of adding Bluetooth into the GX nav system. It is easy enough to install a Bluetooth kit so it will at least automatically mute the radio during a call and allow voice dialing. There are Bluetooth kits from many major companies - Parrot, Nokia, Motorola, etc. Not that it is the best kit but Lexus dealers in the U.K. and Europe sell the Motorola IHF1000 Bluetooth kit as an official Lexus accessory. Non-integrated Bluetooth handsfree products such as those that mount on a sun visor have become very inexpensive -- plenty of them for less than $50 -- but they won't mute your radio when a call is in progress.

http://www.lexus.com/models/RX/accessories/bluetooth.html Click on "Find a new phone". Then select the phones in which you are interested and see how compatible they are with the Bluetooth system in your RX.

Here is a link to a battery size chart: http://www.rtpnet.org/~teaa/bcigroup.html The battery group size is often shown on a label on the top of the battery although I noticed when I just now checked our Camry that the group size "24F" is embedded in the battery model of its Toyota Truestart battery. Our 00 LS400 has the same group 24F battery size in it. Sometimes smaller batteries (e.g. group 24 for the LS400) are listed as being compatible but I try to buy the largest battery that will fit in the battery holder -- the largest batteries that will fit the battery tray usually have the most cranking power. That said, I do not know what group size is used in your GS. I have not noticed a correlation between price and battery life although a correlation may exist, and I've never had a battery last nearly as long as its rated life in months no matter how well I take care of them. Batteries in our Lexus LS cars over the past 19 years have usually lasted from 3 - 5 years although one failed after only one year. I've decided to give up on buying expensive batteries and bought the last one at Walmart -- installed it myself in their parking lot rather than wait in line -- an easy five minute job using the wrenches in the Lexus tool kit. I wait until a battery shows signs of weakness/failure before I replace it -- I haven't been stranded yet or at least my luck has held for over 40 years. One thing to watch out for if you buy a battery with removal battery caps is to verify that the battery hold-down bracket and any engine compartment battery trim covers do not interfere with the removal of the caps. I've never purchased a supposedly maintenance free battery. I'm in the engine compartment checking all the fluid levels weekly anyway so I keep a battery bottle filled with distilled water on a shelf in the garage.

Yes, the 225/65-17 tires and wheels should work fine. Your speedometer will read 1.206% slower but that is well within the acceptable range. You can check for yourself with this tire size calculator: http://www.1010tires.com/TireSizeCalculato...p?action=submit

The "Mickey Mouse" DRL kits you don't like are used on thousands of U.S. spec cars imported into Canada each year. Most Canadian Tire stores can install a DRL kit in a few minutes. I'm a big fan of DRL or driving with headlights on during the day -- since the 1960s when I realized that my little silver 2-seater was just about invisible to oncoming traffic on 2-lane highways. There are plenty of DRL kits available but most require some wire cutting. Here is a good site: http://www.daytime-running-lights.com/ Another alternative is to drive with your headlights on during the day. I've done that on every car without DRL I've owned or rented since the 60's and my wife does that every day in her 98 Camry. In fact, we never turn the Camry's headlights off since they go on and off with the ignition switch.

Yes. You can read about what was optional here: http://www.lexus.com/contact/pdf/2001/2001LSspecs.pdf

> What Is The Effect Of Worn Strut Rod Bushings? When the strut rod bushings got bad on my 00 LS at about 70 - 80K miles, the front end had a vibration that was particularly bad above 60 mph. I don't remember a "clunk" but the memory may have faded. The front suspension on the 90 LS I had for 13 1/2 years got pretty noisy when it needed suspension work. I notice the wind noise too but I don't think it is any worse than in the 90 LS I had. It may be more noticeable because the drive train is quieter. There was a TSIB for the 98-00 LS about the wind noise that involved gluing all sorts of flexible sealing stuff into the outside mirror housings but most of the stuff fell out. I lube the door gaskets with silicon spray a couple of times a year to help the doors seal better and in an attempt to reduce the noise. One reason I use summer tires instead of all season tires in spring/summer/fall is that they are quieter. All season tires were never standard on the LS400 -- they were a no cost option. The noise readings in the test specs you read are likely with summer tires.

Any pan that holds at least five (preferably six) quarts and fits under your car can be used to catch the oil from the sump. I use various pans I bought at discount stores. A Toyota Camry with a V6 engine uses the same oil filter that an ES300 uses. It's often less expensive to buy filters for a Lexus at a Toyota dealer. Be sure to also get a replacement oil plug gasket. My wife drives a Camry V6 which is mechanically virtually identical to the ES300 of the same year -- it is very easy to change the oil on her Camry and quite a bit easier than on my LS. The oil filter on a Camry/ES300 engine is on the front of the engine and is easy to access and remove. You will need an inexpensive oil filter wrench made for the smaller import car oil filter and you should put a drip pan under the oil filter when you remove it. Okay well can you give me any step by step instructions? I suggest you buy a car maintenance book and perhaps have a friend show you how it is done. There are a few basic safety concerns ... like never crawling under a car supported only by a jack ... and some practical matters on hand tightening the oil filter and tightening the drain plug gently but firmly so that you don't strip the threads. I have to remind myself that changing oil seems simple to me since my father showed me how to do it by age 12 and one of my chores was to change the oil in the family cars. Changing oil in either of our cars is about a 30 minute operation and I do a number of other maintenance checks during the process. I drop off the used oil for recycling about once a year at a quick oil change shop a few blocks from the house. It's easier if you have basic tools: metric wrenches, oil filter wrench, floor jack, jack stands, creeper ( http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/creeper ). Good quality tools last a long time -- I bought my metric ratchet wrench set about 40 years ago. My wife's niece took her Honda Element to a Shell "maintenance center" in Des Moines for an oil change yesterday morning. By 2:00 pm when we arrived, there was a good size puddle of oil on the floor of her garage -- pretty typical of the quality of work I've seen from "iffy lube" type shops.

"There is nothing they can do" is not an acceptable answer. Call Lexus corporate customer service and complain loudly. We have a similar set up in both our 98 Camry and our 00 LS and have no problems with radio reception when we turn the rear window defroster on.

If your battery has screw out plugs, it's a supposedly maintenance-free or low maintenance battery. I say "supposedly" because all a maintenance free battery does is have features that limit evaporation and have screw out plugs or non-removable that make it difficult or impossible to add tap water. Tap water is the death of batteries. There is nothing wrong with topping up the cells of a maintenance free battery that has removable plugs with distilled water -- never use tap water. Here is some good information: http://www.theautochannel.com/news/2005/11/30/150966.html I keep a battery bottle filled with distilled water in my garage. I check our batteries about once a month and almost always find a cell or two that needs topping up.

Any pan that holds at least five (preferably six) quarts and fits under your car can be used to catch the oil from the sump. I use various pans I bought at discount stores. A Toyota Camry with a V6 engine uses the same oil filter that an ES300 uses. It's often less expensive to buy filters for a Lexus at a Toyota dealer. Be sure to also get a replacement oil plug gasket. My wife drives a Camry V6 which is mechanically virtually identical to the ES300 of the same year -- it is very easy to change the oil on her Camry and quite a bit easier than on my LS. The oil filter on a Camry/ES300 engine is on the front of the engine and is easy to access and remove. You will need an inexpensive oil filter wrench made for the smaller import car oil filter and you should put a drip pan under the oil filter when you remove it.

According to Crutchfield, this one should work in a sat radio compatible Lexus LS430: http://www.crutchfield.com/p_541HDRT/Perip...ner.html?tp=134 I'm having a hard time believing that the benefits of HD radio would be noticeable even in a car as quiet as an LS unless it was parked with the engine off.

There are photos and instructions for a similar 96 LS at the bottom of this thread --> http://us.lexusownersclub.com/forums/index...957&hl=mute If that doesn't fix the problem you might need to unplug the handset and/or cradle. The phone cradle plugs into one or more connectors under the vent you see with the arm rest is raised. There was more than one phone system available in the 93-up LS400 -- a fixed phone and a portable phone. I've only seen the fixed phones and don't know what you would find in your trunk if you have a portable Lexus phone. One more thing ... if you feel the need for a newer phone kit such as a Bluetooth kit for a portable phone, there is an audio system mute terminal in the drivers side phone connector under the center console. If fact, it is possible that a defective handset or cradle is grounding this mute pin and that the problem is not with the phone module in your trunk. But disconnect the phone module in the trunk per the instructions first to see if that takes care of the problem.

Wow, I didn't notice that Pro.Fit has a new "G3" bracket that fits the Nuvi without using an AMPS adapter -- looks like a better way to go: http://www.pro-fit-intl.com/G3index

Whoa, don't use WD40 in a lock -- it can really gum things up. Use lock lubricant from a hardware store.

Most likely only 1990 - 1992 clusters are the same. There were significant changes introduced in 1993 including an electronic, instead of a mechanical, odometer. This web page has a summary of changes: http://www.lexls.com/info/lsgenerations.html

Here is a link to the Lexus Personalized Settings (LPS) the dealer can alter for you: http://www.lexus.com/pdf/service/GS_LPS.pdf