1990LS400

LS98, Your picture looks like the ones sold at http://www.exoticwooddash.com and the diagrams on their site appear to show the little slots for the labels. The minimal 3-piece set for the center air vents, AC/heat, and audio system are listed at $142. The have detailed install instructions too. Would applying a kit like this to an audio system prevent from doing a radio exchange if you had to? My repair shop owner told me that the repair service he uses only exchanges radios and does not normally want to return the one sent for repair. It is amazing how many varieties of kits that exoticwooddash has. Gosh, looks like you could cover everything except your dog with wood!

The white 98 sure sounds like it was better cared for. I think the DRL's can be activated inexpensively - I place a very high value on them. I thought it was interesting that a study in New Zealand found that silver was the safest color. (Do a Google search for "Car color and safety".) Or could it be those wacky guys just pulling our legs? Back in the 60's, I let my sister drive my silver Mercedes 190SL (a terrible car but that is another story). While driving another car, I met my sister on the highway coming from the other way. OK, the 190LS is a small car, but the silver color blended in with the highway color on this hot summer day and made it seem almost invisible. Suddenly I realized why I'd had so many close calls when someone tried to pass on oncoming car. I started driving with my headlights on. And I never bought another silver car. I have read that white is the safest car color except in snowy areas when it was 2nd safest and when yellow was best. But there is a lot of controvery. We now only buy white cars and my wife has now gone six years in her white car without getting hit - she got hit every few months in the dark red car she once had. Nav would be fun although I told my friend "no Nav, no air suspension" when he searched for the 2000 LS that I bought recently. I was mainly concerned with the added complexity since I plan to keep this car a long time and do not know how long updates will be available. Heck, if Lexus phones that came in these cars are getting marginal or no support from Lexus, how long can we expect updates for their older Nav systems? If you want Nav, you could always add a Garmin StreetPilot on a bracket and you could take it with you. (Garmin - a wonderful company! - headquarters just down the road from me.) Here is a recent photo of my both my current and first LS - both white of course.

Gosh, this is a tough question -- there are lots of factors to consider. I plan to take my 2000 LS to the dealer for service only until the warranty expires late this summer. I want to be absolutely sure that, if there are any "product improvement programs" (i.e. fixing things that are likely to break in the future), that all the work gets done during the warranty period. I took my first LS to the dealer too during the warranty period. Although there seems to be fewer bugs in these cars than in the early days, I suspect that some non-maintenance, unrequested, free work is still being done by the dealer during the warranty period. I've been fortunate because there have been one or more excellent non-dealer repair shops in my area that specialize in Lexus - and they have been owned by former Lexus service managers or service writers and all the mechanics were formerly with the Lexus dealer. The quality of work has been better and prices lower than at the dealer. And sometimes the owners and mechanics at these small businesses have become friends and customers. The answer might also depend on how long you plan to keep your car. A buyer of a high mileage cars may care less that it was maintained by a dealer. It is probably more important that you keep complete records to pass on to the next owner. The records I passed to the next owner of my first LS even included every gas fill-up. Although the free bagels, brew-to-order gourmet coffee, plasma TV's and sumptuous furniture in the dealer's waiting room are nice, I know this helps keep their prices high. I'm looking forward to when the warranty expires and I go back to my favorite independent repair shop.

Everybody likes Lexus cars. Right? Here is how you can have more of them. A solution that can work very well is to adopt a "staggered purchase" stategy. The scenario: Your family is like most in my neighborhood and you have an average of three cars. And you prefer to have a nice new car every three years or so. Action: Buy (i.e. save in an investment account and then pay cash) a quality car (Lexus, Toyota, etc.) every three years. Keep each car nine years - quite close to the current U.S. average. (Or buy a low mileage car off a short term lease, let the lessee take the worst of "the depreciation bath" and keep it almost as long.) Result: Your family will always have a quality car to drive and which is no more than three years old. You will save a substantial amount of money by keeping each car past its depreciable life. And you will have a variety of fun and interesting cars to drive. A quote from the book "Management", by Robert Kreitner (available at Amazon.com) relates to the information I have been providing: "Studies of middle-class families have shown that, overall, the best influencer and indicator of total accumulated assets over a lifetime is how long people keep their cars. Those who buy new cars every few years had a much smaller total worth at retirement than those who kept cars for five or more years. So, in a way, the quality focus of today's cars may be contributing to the total wealth of today's middle class." I know a lot of this seems complex and "not fun" but it really isn't and can provide you with real economic power. By planning purchases carefully and avoiding debt and leases for depreciating assets, most people can vastly improve their economic situation - and have nicer, fun cars too. By participating in this forum, I'm not just trying to help with what we have learned from 14 years of Lexus ownership. I am also providing information we gained from life. And yes, I am probably very senior in age compared to most forum participants - but I love cars!

Yes, if you keep cars for a short time, leasing will be less expensive than buying. But an aspect of Lexus cars and Toyota vehicles in general is that they are incredibly reliable and can provide a wonderful driving experience over a very long time. Keeping a vehicle past its depreciable life is always less espensive than leasing and frees up money for other uses. The difference gets bigger the longer you keep a vehicle and can add up to a staggering amount. People have different goals and personally I find it very satisfying to buy a nice car, take care of it, and drive it for a long time. We kept our first LS almost 14 years and the young person we sold it to told me his neighbors think it is brand new. The concepts regarding the acquisition of a car (value "always" falls) and a house (value "always" rises) are completely different. The lease/buy choice is discussed in lots of financial texts and a brief overview is at: http://www.auto-consultant.com/LeaseVBuy.html

Here is a link to how to pop out the radio in the 95 - 97 LS: http://carstereohelp.com/stereoremovalLexusLS400str1.htm

Analyzing the effect of the cash/lease/mortgage decision on a particular person's financial situation is too complex to discuss in this forum. My wife and I have spent most of our professional lives in the financial industry and we are aware that our views on this subject are different than those of the general population.

The "VSM Legend Series" bracket at http://www.pro-fit-intl.com/ looks interesting. Panavise brackets can be seen at http://www.panavise.com/ You might try calling a phone installer in your area. I had a choice of several bracket styles from installers in the Kansas City area.

I did not expect my post on leasing to be particularly popular. This subject is certainly something that my wife (a CPA) and I have often discussed. We recommend that anyone considering a lease or mortgage thoroughly "run the numbers" on all three options: cash purchase, mortgage, and lease. Use the real numbers - not what you would like them to be. Consider all the tax consequences, opportunity costs, depreciation, etc. Frankly, we doubt that most people can do all this without the aid of an unbiased professional. Even when people understand the numbers, I still hear: "But I really want this car and leasing or a loan is the only way I can afford it". Ignoring the numbers and going ahead and leasing or financing a car does not make one a bad person. My only point is that if people really understood the numbers, some of them might change their behavior and be better off in the long run. And some of them would not. It is all about personal choice and each of us has to decide for himself. I probably got on this soap box in the first place because it is very disturbing seeing so many "high income / low net worth" people who are deeply in debt.

I'd doubt it would be feasible from a cost or technical standpoint to retrofit a Lexus Bluetooth interface. There are other Bluetooth kits from Nokia, the CK Parrot, which might work for you although they are not at sophisticated as the Lexus Bluetooth which a lot of people seem to be complaining about anyway. Regarding the bracket, a very similar bracket was used by a Cingular installer in both our 90 LS and 98 Camry to position our Nokia handsets to the right of the radio. I think we were charged about $15 each for it. Two approximately 3/8 inch self tapping screws were used and they were so short that there was no worry about coming though the visible side of the console. Bolting the radio/ventilation unit back into place also contributed to holding the bracket firmly in place. One thing I have noticed about the "no-drilling" brackets is that they are made to mount where the designer thought the handset should be positioned. I've seen some that, when mounted as designed, blocked the air flow from a vent. I didn't particular care for where the installer mounted the bracket in my LS and it took only a few minutes to pop out the radio and reposition the bracket exactly where I wanted it. Sometimes I think we need a separate forum category for phones!

Well is Lenexa Kansas close enough? And "99LSguy" lives in Lees Summit and is quite active in these forums.

Whether one buys, leases, or pays cash really boils down to how one wants to spend his or her money. Leasing, like buying a car on a mortgage, is providing profits to others. There is no "free lunch". One of the easiest routes to financial independence is to avoid paying other people to use their money but to instead have other people pay you to use your money. The "spread" between what you would pay others in interest on a lease or mortgage to use their (a bank's) money and what you would gain by having others pay you to use your money is large and can exceed 20% of your income during periods of normal interest rates. And its even worse (or better depending on your perpective) than that because of compounding. It is like increasing your income by 20% with no effort. Don't get me wrong. There have been times when leasing a car made business sense if you could write it off. But not now and not recently. Increasing your income in this way by avoiding debt and investing wisely will free you from fear of economic volitility, provide for a comfortable retirement, and allow you to buy just as many, if not a lot more, nice Lexus vehicles. I wish I had learned these "Finance 101" concepts at an even earlier age but it is never too late to learn. Personally, I benefit financially when others lease or mortgage their vehicles. But who would you rather pay? Yourself or me?

Let me be the first to congratulate you for accomplishing this. Electrical issues can be very difficult to track down. My repair shop tried off and on for years to figure out why a dash light showing a brake light out would occasionally come on when the brake light was still working fine. I was starting to suspect the expensive lamp failure module but by chance found the real cause which was a loose connection in the trailer light wiring harness installed by the hitch company. We need people like you with electrical skills in this forum! Welcome aboard!

Dogboy! Did I understand you correctly that you have integrated a non-Lexus handsfree phone into the factory phone controls and wiring? If so, and based on what I'm reading on this and other Lexus forums, there are a huge number of poeple who would like to do this. I don't know if you've read my recent posts on phone topics but I'm about to attempt to integrate my Nokia CARK-91 car kit into the LS audio system using a wiring harness I ordered today from a company in the U.K. Any information on how you accomplished integrating your handsfree phone would be appreciated by lots of people. Cases of beer or better would start showing up on your doorstep! Or you could write an instruction manual and sell it.

I tend to think that the phone jack and little speaker were left over from a previously installed non-Lexus phone. The early Lexus phones were analog only, hardwired into the car, had a steering wheel control left of the horn/airbag cover, and played the call through the audio system when in handsfree mode. The rear window antenna used a cable that was prewired into the car and which you can probably see if you look near the rear center of the headliner. I started out with a hardwired phone when I bought my LS in 1990 but sure wish I had switched to a handheld much sooner when I found out how much more useful they are. You could always put in a car kit for a handheld phone or just install an inexpensive phone holder. Car kits are fairly straight forward to install although some kits require removing/reinstalling quite a lot of trim and stuff to run the wires. Consumer Reports had a good article on cell phone service in a recent issue and particularly highlighted the issues with GSM in the U.S. I'd recommend searching the forum for "phone". I think you will find that most people are not using the original Lexus phones.

I'm struggling to remember if the screws under the little pop-in plastic ventilation grill have to be removed in order the remove the console insert or if they have to be removed only when removing the entire console. This is the little grill that passes air to the back seat when the console cover is closed - you can see at the back of the console when the lid is up. When removing the console insert, use a regular scewdriver with the blade well taped to avoid damage when prying the insert out. I usually started prying out the insert by inserting the taped screwdriver blade between the console insert and the upholstered portion just ahead of the coin holder. The first time I pryed the console insert out I thought I was going to break something! While you have the console apart, it might be a good time to replace the bulb that lights the rear cigarette lighter. Take care to reinstall the plastic shield around the tiny light bulb when reinserting it. If your 91 is like my 90 was, I think you will see where the Lexus phone plugs in after you remove the console insert. I must have removed the console insert and sometimes the entire console seven or eight times as we changed phones during the many years we had the 90 LS. As many times as I disassembled the console, you would think I would remember the procedure exactly but I'm having a "senior moment". You could always leave the antenna on the glass in the event you want to use it some day with a handheld phone's car kit. My external analog antenna seemed to add signal strength even to our digital handheld phones.

A Lexus dealer parts department might be able to answer your question or perhaps you could contact a salvage yard. I had a 90 LS for many years and bought a 2000 LS recently. I suspect that the back seats are different because it was obvious how to remove the backseat bottom cushion in the 90 LS (by pulling the two tabs) but there are no tables on the cushion of the 2000 LS. Consider using seats from a 91-92 since those cars were virtually identical to your 90 or from a 93-94 which were still not all that much different. If the seats are basically sound, maybe an auto upholstery shop could redo them. Good luck!

I did - finally - get a radio mute lead harness ordered early this morning from Dashmount in the U.K. for about $80 US. Whether or not it will properly interface with the audio system in our U.S spec. Camry and LS400 or come with adequate installation instructions is still unknown. A local phone installer I spoke with yesterday seems very enthusiastic about doing the installation but will require me to sign a damage waiver. The Dashmount rep said that the reason I have been getting their voice mailbox when I called was that they are being inundated with calls because a new laws there provide for very large fines for using a handheld phone while driving. I'll post the results although I expect it will be a few weeks at best.

Because of a rather serious vision problem, I spent much of 13+ years experimenting with bulbs on my 90 LS. Frankly, if I had test driven the 90 LS at night, I would not have bought it. It was a frightening to switch from my other cars with Euro code lights. Sadly, the limiting factor is the beam pattern in the lense. You can throw as much wattage as you want at these lenses and you will mainly just get a more glare - especially for on-coming drivers and a bigger "blob" of light. An excellent explanation of this issue is provided by a company I have done business with at --> http://www.susquehanna.com/susq/hella/bulb_help.htm The best bulbs I found were uncoated "GE 9004 HO" (high output) which had a mix of Xenon and halogen gases. They were relatively inexpensive (about $15 for a 2-pack) but I have not seen them in a while. Fortuanately they seemed to last "forever" compared to the 80/100 bulbs I tried that burned out in a few months. Maybe it was an aberation, but one exploding 80/100 bulb trashed a lens and reflector. Personally, I think the best solution for an early LS is to find complete headlight assemblies from a 93-94 at a junkyard. My understanding is that they had a beam pattern with a sharp cutoff more like Euro code lights and also use 55-60 watt H4 bulbs.

K9Crew, that is a wonderful picture of your phone handset and the photo will help me position my similarly sized Nokia privacy handset better than what I had planned. Thanks for going to all the trouble. It is a shame that Lexus phone can't be used in conjuction with your Sony Ericsson T616 or that Lexus didn't help with conversion to a newew technology. The upholstery color in your Lexus is the same color as mine but I like yours more than the "lizard-leather" grain used in the seat cushions of my Platinum Series. SW03ES, I called the Kansas City installer, listed on Cellport.com. He was unwilling to hook up the mute wire from the Cellport to the Lexus audio system or to any other car audio system because of the liability issue. If I can stuggle out of bed early enough tomorrow morning before the U.K. company closes for its extended lunch hour, I'm going to phone order the radio interface harness for my Nokia phone's car kit. I ordered several items including the repair manuals from Sewell in Texas this afternoon. I'll be all ready to "disasemble" the LS soon! Heck, I've always like taking cars apart just for the fun of it.

SW03ES, thanks for the information on Cellport. How long have you had your Cellport in your Lexus and how well does it work? A feature of the Nokia car kit system that would be hard to do without is the "privacy handset" which is used by my wife in the front passenger seat and by rear seat passengers. In gives you the best of both worlds - hands-free speaker phone and household type corded handset so that I am not distracted when people are talking on the phone while I am driving. K9crew, I'm hoping that the insert in the upper console tray in the 90-00 LS can be pried out like the entire console insert did in my 90 LS (I had to remove about 4 screws first in the 90 LS). I have not yet bought the repair manuals for the 2000 LS (been too lazy) and I did not want to try removing the upper console tray insert without instructions. I'm planning to put the Nokia privacy handset in the upper console tray where your Lexus handset is now. Our Nokia car kit installations are a temporary measure until GSM-only phones works better in the U.S. or until Bluetooth is used on more than just GSM-only phones. I'd love to just buy Bluetooth phones and CK Parrot or Nokia Bluetooth car kits but GSM-only phones do not work at all in some rural areas where we travel. My current tri-mode Nokia phone does everything - GSM, old style digital and also analog (I forget all those TDMA, etc. initials) and I'm surprised how much time it spends in analog mode while traveling 300 miles to Iowa football games. (My nephew plays tight end. GO HAWKEYES!) All that will change in the next few years as GSM becomes the standard like it has always been in Europe.

Blake, Yes, the Nokia car kits, and many kits from other manufacturers, have a wire that in theory can be connected with a car's audio system to mute the radio. But I could not get the phone kit installer to attach the mute wire in either of our cars because of the liability issue. The instructions that come with the Nokia kit are a little hazy on how to connect the mute wire and the Lexus audio system is designed with a direct interface only to the Lexus phones. I am hoping that an auto mute lead (really just a specialized wiring harness) designed for Camry and LS400 will make the connections straight forward. If the call can be routed through the radio speakers, it should be easier to hear than from the Nokia speaker tucked up under the dash. I may be wasting $80 if it doesn't work. Nokia has quite a few different phone and car kit models. The CARK-91 has been around a long time and is sold world wide. Something to realize - each time we upgrade phones or one of our phones fails, we have to stay with a phone compatible with the car kits. So if you have to have the "latest and greatest" camera/MP3 phone, you might end up buying a car kit each time you change phones. The main reason that I'm trying to interface the CARK-91 kit to the audio system and mute the radio is that there is a design flaw (Cingular calls it a feature!) that causes my new Nokia 6340i phone to ring so softly when it is in the car kit that I can't hear it when the radio/CD is on. I really don't know how the Nokia car kits compare with those from other companies. We mainly are trying to stretch our dollars by continuing to use the same design phones and kits. It is really not too tough to install a car kit if you have some basic mechanical knowledge and especially if you have the Lexus repair manuals. The installers did not do a very good job on either of our cars and I ended up repositioning most of the components. If you want to see how variety of manufacturer's car kits are installed (but in a Mini Cooper), there are very detailed instructions in the technical section at www.mini2.com. Most of the concepts are the same as for a Lexus.

Based on the lack of response to similar questions on this and other forums, it does not look like anyone has found a solution to this question. The whole factory phone issue seems to be a real thorn for Lexus. The analog system that my local Lexus dealer was having a "fire sale" on in the mid-90's may be the best working system they ever came up with. I am hopeful that Bluetooth will eventually resolve some of the issues. Unfortunately all the the Bluetooth phones that are available from my local providers are GSM only - not a good thing when traveling off the beaten path. I spent a lot of time searching this and other forums and the Internet looking for a way simply to integrate my tri-mode handheld Nokia's CARK-91 car kit into the audio system on my 2000 LS. Companies in the U.K., Europe and Australia sell "auto mute leads" that interface with a handheld phone's car kit, mute the audio system on an incoming/outgoing call, and play the call through the vehicles front speakers. Apparently the same kit fits just about any Toyota/Lexus made in the 90's although there is no assurance that it will work in a U.S. spec model. Off course you wouldn't be able to use your existing steering wheel phone control. Coincidentally, I'm about to order an auto mute lead (about $80 including shipping) tomorrow from a U.K. company and will try it first in our Camry. I'm not an electrical guru and my repair shop owner has recommended an auto shop to do the hookup. If the first mute lead works OK in the Camry, I'll order another mute lead for the LS although it having the Nakamichi may be a problem. I'm planning to report back here on my success or lack thereof or PM me if you want me to let you know. It will probably be a month or two. Heck, I was just happy last night when I found the coax cable for the LS's embedded rear window phone antenna and hooked it to the Nokia car kit - the signal strength meter on the phone zoomed up to maximum!

My 90 LS started making a a farly loud creaking/groaning noise at the front end at about the four year mark (about 60K) when I drove over speed bumps at low speeds. The dealer lubed some bushings at the front and the noise disappeared for a year or so. When I told the dealer that heads were turning to look at the car when it made the noise, he was quick to replace the bushings at no cost! Must have been another one of those "secret recalls". I drove the car another 125K and the noise never returned.

The noise could be from the mechanical odometer's little drive gear starting to fail. Mine started making a similar noise at about 120K although it continued to record the miles. I finally had it replaced at 125K since the noise sort of spoiled the silence. I always liked being able to hear my wrist watch ticking while driving - OK, my watch ticks pretty loudly! You might try using an auto stethoscope to zero in on the source of the noise - they cost only a few bucks at an auto parts store and are handy for figuring out noise sources in the engine compartment too.