lexusnutt

There is a TSB on this exact issue. They replace the brakes.

Here is most of 'em

http://www.lambros.net/2007LS460L/tsib/

Hey all! I just bought an '07 LS460 and need to sell my inventory of LS400 tune-up parts to a good home. These will fit a 1995-2000 LS400

• (1) WIX Airfilter
  
• (2) WIX Oil Filters
  
• (1) Nippon Fuel Filter
  
• (1) Cabin Filter
  
• (1) Bottle of Type IV Transmission Fluid
  

All items are new and factory fresh. I'll sell the whole lot and throw in a can of BG44k fuel cleaner for for $70 including shipping!

Thanks for reading and Drive on!

Just changed my oil using new Amsoil product.

Gas mileage went up 2.7 MPG

It was really unbelievable. I've driven the same trip dozens of times never getting more than 26.8 MPG. This time I got 29.5.

As an added bonus, smoother and with more power.

A 10% MPG increase =$6-7 per tankful.

http://www.amsoil.com/articlespr/2007/pr_SSO.aspx

Oh yeah, forgot about this one. Retorque the driveshaft

I get a vibration when I drive my Lexus. Its not a clunking suspension type vibration, but one like the tires are overinflated (like Im driving on wooden wheels) or it might be a transmission vibration (bad trans mount?) Or a bad wheel bearing? Im not really up on these cars suspension but I did change the lower ball joints and checked anything I could while I was down there. The UCA's are a tiny bit worn, but it moves just a hair when I pull on it. What should I look for? All the bushings I could see were good and the car has only 92K on it. It irks me to know that my 96 Plymouth Breeze rides better than this car! No clunks over bumps, just an almost grinding vibration while driving, more noticeable when driving slow. I can feel it in the steering wheel as well as the floorboard. Thanks

Here's the Lexus repair manual's troubleshooting guide for the suspension. I hope it helps you isolate the problem. I've replaced so many suspension and steering parts on mine that I know how you feel.:cries: Unfortunately it was before I felt confident/comfortable working on my Lexus and so I wasted a lot of money paying someone to do what I could have done all along. Good luck with yours.

sa_4_suspension_and_axle_troubleshoot.pdf

Thanks. I will look into the trans/motor mount, as it feels like a rotating vibration and I feel it in the controls. Im also wondering about the steering damper or whatever that shock absorber looking thing is under the rack. When I hit a small bump in a turn the wheel kinda jumps. Tie rod ends? Im a DIY'er to the fullest extent, but will swallow my pride and have a indie Lex mechanic look into this along with analignment. He did wonders to my Dads SC400. Oh yeah, My correct spec Kelly tires say 44psi, but the door says 36psi(OEM gumball tires?) who do I go by?

Strut Rods will take care of the jumping problem. Even a warped or worn brake rotor will create vibration. Tires are EXTREMELY important. Get the car "road force" balanced. It will spot out of round conditions. LS's are very sensitive. I did everything above and eventually got rid of it. Good luck.

I agree wholeheartedly. I had one on my F-150 and noticed that after 3000 miles, the oil was filthy (only 10k on it). After switching back, no problems. I can only imagine the damage I've done to it. :cries:

There are a lot of threads on this topic but to summarize, if ANY auto manufacturer thought that a "screen door" filter would add more horsepower w/ better mileage, they would all do it.

Would save them millions of dollars in R&D costs...

Flow through the K&N has never been argued. Hell it's like a screen door, the problem is that it doesn't filter out the fine harmful dust and silica. The website is temporarily down but when it comes back up I'll post the link... but here's one chart & text from it

(the below text is from the test)

"In the chart above it’s important to note the different test durations for each filter. The AC Delco filter test ran for 60 minutes before exceeding the restriction limit while the AMSOIL and K&N tests each ran for 20 and 24 minutes respectively before reaching max restriction. In 60 minutes the AC Filter accumulated 574gms of dirt and passed only 0.4gms. After only 24 minutes the K&N had accumulated 221gms of dirt but passed 7.0gms. Compared to the AC, the K&N plugged up nearly 3 times faster, passed 18 times more dirt and captured 37% less dirt. See the data tables for a complete summary of these comparisons. "

I have the entire website saved since K&N filters are a common subject in another forum I moderate but the above chart and comments from that ISO test are typical of how the test results turned out.

Again... it's a no-brainer that K&N's have high flow rates but the real issue is that they don't trap and hold much dirt, it passes way more dirt into the engine than any of the other filters tested. Personally I don't race my Lexus (nor do I race my offroad Jeep) so I could care less if it flows more air, I am more interested in keeping harmful dust, dirt, and silica out of my very expensive engines. What I do know is that my personal experience with K&N filters coincides with that of the ISO testing and for a Lexus, I think it'd be short-sighted to want to run a K&N air filter. Our Lexuses were not designed to be high performance cars, at least not in the traditional sense of that phrase, so installing a higher flowing air filter solely to produce better performance just doesn't make sense to me. It certainly won't contribute to better fuel economy, it just doesn't work that way. :)

Where do I get an AC Delco???

Do you have any pictures? If the seats look HORRIBLE as well as have little support, your dealer may be "forced" to do something. I accidently damaged my leather using the wrong cleaners... A few months later i have brand new leather at no charge to me <_<

I took the car to the dealer to show them what it looked like. I "may" have made the seats look worse than they really were... :whistles: (a bit of acetone and 100 grit sandpaper really works...) I told the service manager i took the car to an upholstery shop who stated the leather was damaged using chemicals. I bought the car CPO a few years ago so i made it seem it wasn't me who caused the damage. Ask them why YOU should have to pay when it was someone else's mistake... It should have been fixed before it was sold.

He stated that it was just "normal wear" (clearly wasn't)

After 5 more minutes of arguing, i asked, "Have you ever seen this before on such a new vehicle? Is it a known problem?"

He responded with, "No it's the first time."

I now stated, "but a few minutes ago you said it was normal wear! If you've never seen this before, how can it be normal?"

Catch them in lies, call corporate in CA a few times, and never let it go. You will get what you want B)

You "accidently" damaged your leather using wrong cleaners? You "may" have made them look worse? That's stealing. Just like insurance fraud. Increases prices for honest people. :chairshot:

Karma baby, Karma.

GT, I just posted a solution to my hard ride and vibration problems. Tires, balancing and strut rods.

I would check these items first....

Nutt

After bringing my car back and forth to the stealer a few times, I firmly requested that they investigate and resolve the vibration and ride issue once and for all. It was there for a low idle issue anyway and I wanted to be done once and for all!

The solution was replacing tires that were out of round (crappy Pirelli p zero nero with Michelins) road force rebalancing 3 times, and finally replacing the front strut rods. The bushings on the strut rods were worn out prematurely probably due to the crappy tires and poor balancing over a period of time.

The car now rides perfectly. I was prepared to shell out some major dollars to have all the shocks replaced, but that was not the case.

The price to get them done would've been $500 but luckily the rods were covered under warranty.

Cheers!

I finally got my car back from the dealer for the low idle issue. They replaced the throttle body (luckily under warranty). When I picked it up, it still had the same issue. Low idle at 400 RPM unless the lights or A/C was on. Upset that they released it to me without confirming it was fixed, I returned it to them and firmly asked that they resolve the issue. 2 days later (and a ES350 loaner ), they said the contacted a Lexus engineer and found that the ECM had to be reprogrammed for the new throttle body. There was no TSB on it and that's why it took so long to diagnose.

Well, needless to say it worked! The idle remains at 700 RPM no matter what the condition is. Throttle response is also MUCH better. I'm a happy camper as it now runs perfectly! I imagine a through cleaning of the TB will work, but the reprogramming was the key in my case.

Cheers!

Look for another car. If one has doubts, they're usually justified.

Good luck!

Thanks SKperformance for the tip - I will be doing so either later today or tomorrow and I hope that will take care of it.

If I am not mistaken the steps are very simple:

1- Make sure that the engine has been warmed up then turn it off and add 1/2 a bottle of seafoam (6 Ounces) then re-start the engine and let it idle for 15 minutes.

2- Turn off the engine and let sit for an hour.

3- Drain the oil and then flush with 2 quarts of oil.

4- Replace the old filter with a new one and fill the engine with fresh oil and that should do it.

Also do you recommend doing the Throttle Body with Seafoam, if so can I use the hose that goes to the brake booster to feed the left of the seafoam through ? or do you recommend other hoses to do the job through.

I heard that this may foul up the spark plugs ??? (not sure on this one) but also will not hydro lock the engine, once the engine had taken all the 6 ounces of seafoam turn off the engine and let it stand for 15 minutes and then re-start and do some spirited type driving from there.

I hope I am correct in my details above....please feel free to add any comments to correct me or that can help me complete this procedure properly.

Thanks in advance and I appreciate all of your feed back.

Al

Al, I had the same exact problem with my '00 as you are experiencing. Drove me crazy!

I did the seafoam in the oil and booster and the problem seems improved with the idle dropping maybe 10% of the time. Maybe I'll do another treatment and it'll get the other 10%!

I checked my plugs after the treatment and although they seemed to be fine, I replaced them anyway (50k). I think the thin wire iridium plugs are less inclined to foul.

On another note, to avoid hydrolock, do not let the car get too warm prior to feeding seafoam through the booster...

Good luck!

The sticker on my fusebox says that in case of battery replacement, put the parking brake on FIRMLY, car in park, reconnect the terminals, start the car and wait up to 15 seconds. It worked for me.

I would get a 1998, 99, 2001, 2002, 2003 or 2005, 2004 had problems with the fuel pump. I wrote the other extra years because they seem very good also, the newest and with no accidents and the one that has the lowest miles that is the one I would buy. Try to buy one that has all the major maintenance if not all maintenance done at Lexus. The changes in the Generations are in the site given by another member.

CPR

I'm getting ready to buy a used LS. Probably one from between 2001 and 2005.

I know sometimes car makers have a dud year. And I want to get a certain level of luxury and reliability. So, which model years are best? What changes (good or bad) were made each year?

Cardona, I'm curious why you would not include the 2000 model? Usually, the last year of any body/style change would result in fewest problems. (Maybe I'm biased because I have one) B)

Great deal romy!

The consensus on this board I believe would be synthetic.

I just gave my son my '95 also....enjoy it! They're the best cars in the world!

Then those K&N filters are a rip. I buy the OEM filters by the factory package of 10, and get them wholesale through my business. They work out to $4.85 each Canadian funds. I can assure you that the Toyota designed filter is the best for the engine, which of course is a Toyota design......

Awesome deal SRK! Warehouse prices through your business! Where can we sign up??

So I spend an extra 3 bucks every 5000 miles...big deal. :cries:

FYI, K&N filters are known throughout racing circles in providing ultimate protection especially with the anti-drainback valve.

Features

Drilled safety wire holes for racing

Sturdy 1" wrench nut makes removal quick and easy

Metal leaf spring provides a positive seal between element and lid

Heavy-duty construction provides up to 550 PSI hydrostatic burst strength*

Resin-impregnated filter media provides maximum filtering surface for contaminant removal

Inner core provides extra structural support to prevent filter collapse

Anti-drainback valve (where applicable) eliminates dry starts, prevents oil from draining back into crankcase during engine shutdown

Internally lubricated gasket provides positive seal while allowing easy on and off of filter

Rolled threads provide extra protection against stripping.

BTW, We are only sharing our personal experiences and "opinions" which hopefully doesn't mean we get "ripped" everytime we speak our mind! I challenge you to provide superior specifications with the Toyota/OEM filters. I can assure you that you will have a difficult time.

Have a great day!

Blake, you are right on about the cig lighter being the cause.

I just got the car a week prior and was ready to go for a summer night drive. Mine happened when I tried to plug in my cell phone charger into the outlet. Everything went blank. I also looked for a fuse, but everything was OK. I pushed in the ashtray and lo and behold, it worked! Like the trunk wire, I think the cig lighter wire is too short and wears after multiple pushes on the ashtray. I haven't pushed it since and it's never happened again. I want to fix it, but I don't know how to remove the lighter. Anyone know how to do this?

Cheers!

I have 2 ls400's, so have to stock up on maintenance parts!

I just purchased 6 K&N Performance Gold Filters for 8.50 at ajusa

Shipped free and after the extra 5 bucks off any order over $50, got 'em for a total of $7.66 ea!

IMHO, I think that these are the best you can get! :D

http://www.ajusa.com/cgi-bin/knfilters/det...b302b7423062d78

I don't know about the absolutely widest tires that will fit but I can tell you that the 98-00 LS400 sold in the U.K. with the DHP (Dynamic Handling Package) came with 245/50-17 tires on 17" wheels. (You might want to search the U.K. forum.) That is a big increase over the standard 225's. The U.K. DHP models also came with revised springs that lowered the car a bit -- maybe some other suspension modifications - don't remember. I have noticed that some in the U.K. think that the DHP package makes the ride too firmly but others seem to like the handling improvement.

Thanks for the reply Bob!

I went ahead and bought some P235/55WR-17 Pirelli PZero Nerotires.

I thought about it and only wanted to increase the footprint and height (3/4") slightly so I wouldn't affect tire wear and the ride.

Got a good deal at tirerack on the Pirellis (100.00 ea) They got some good reviews. I'll post after I get 'em and a few miles on 'em.

Cheers!

I've just purchased some 2004 17" OEM LS430 rims to put on my 2000 LS400.

Does anyone know what the widest tire I can put on without an interference?

Thanks in advance for your help!

Cheers!

I'm posting this from the clublexus forum.

http://clublexus.com/forums/showthread.php?t=239568

Full credit goes to Jayjw for his post!

My car is 1994 LS400.

The low idle speed problem is so common among the earlier LS400s. It is very difficult to pin point the problem. I have experiencing the low idle speed problem for about 6 months. Whenever the car stops at traffic light or stop signs, the idle speed was very low, sometimes it was below 200. With AC on it was a bit better. There was a strange symptom, when the air humidity was high like raining, the problem went away. I did quite a lot of study on this forum about this problem. There are many many LS400s having this problem. And people did all kind of things trying to fix it, cleaning the throttle body, replace or adjust the throttle position sensor, clean the idle speed control vavle, etc. but still having the problems.

There is one article giving me a lot of hint. Here is the URL.

http://www.autoshop101.com/forms/h21.pdf

It is talking about the engine air intaking. In it, it mentioned the "Power Steering Idle Up". In short, the power steering draw quite a lot of horse power from engine at low speed. To compensate this power, it use the "Power Steering Idle Up". Basically it is a valve, it opens when the car is moving at very low speed or idling. It gives addtional air to the engine and keeps the idling up. The LS400 has this valve. If you open your car hood, you will see a thin hose from the air intake (right after the Mas Air Sensor) goes to the power steering pump, and another hose gose from power steering pump to the engine air intake, right above the Idle Control Valve. After many years, this valve stops working. It stops giving the addtional air to the engine. And I think it is the LS400 engine ECU programming flaw, when the engine runs at low idle speed, it is only programmed to control the Idle Speed Control Valve in addtion to the power steering idle up valve. It is not programmed smart enough to detect the low idle speed below 650, and to let the Idle Speed Control Valve to give enough air to raise the idle speed to 650. In short, the ECU can not handle the situation when the power steering idle up vavle stopped working.

The above is my analysis after the studying.

To fix the low idle speed is really simple. Just to re-connect the two hose I mentioned above ( one hose from the air intake (right after the Mas Air Sensor) goes to the power steering pump, and another hose gose from power steering pump to the engine air intake, right above the Idle Control Valve).

Here is the steps to solve your low idle speed problem. Refer to the attached picture.

1. Disconnect "hose1" from "nibbles1".

2. Disconnect "hose2" from the Power Steering Pump Idle up valve (this end of hose2 is not shown in the picture).

3. Connect "hose1" (the side just disconnected from "nibbles1") to the Power Steering Pump Idle Up valve ("hose2" just disconnected from it).

4. Connect "hose2" (the side just disconnected from the Power Steering Idle Up valve) to "nibbles1".

It is pretty difficult to disconnect and connect the hoses to to power steering idle up valve because there is not much room down there. What I did was removing the air filter housing, it will give you some extra room to work there.

After I did this, the low idle speed problem went away. Man, do I feel good every time when I see the speed right at 650 in front traffic lights? You bet.

You may ask some questions, does this cause any problem when this hose keeps sending air to engine all the time? I think no. Just think it is equivalent to your gas peddle, it simply give the engine a little bit more air when you drive at high speed, or you can think you lift your gas peddle a tiny bit since this hose give some addtional air. But I can bet you won't feel any difference. When the car moves at low speed, the hose suppose to open, so there is no difference here. Also this hose is right after the Mass

Air Sensor, so it won't cause any unmeasured air issue.

There is an addtional benifit by doing this. The LS400 also has a known problem, leaking Power Steering Fluid to the engin intake. The problem of that is also caused by the Power Steering Idle Up valve. By loop it back, you prevented this future problem.

I think the Toyora engineers should totally eliminate the Power Steering Idle Up valve. Instead, they should use the ECU to detect the low speed and sending the addtional air through Idle Speed Control Valve.

Thanks for the nice comments guys...

It's 1 week later and can't stop staring at her. Hoping to hold this for 5 years until I can afford a 460!

LS03, you're right about the Nav... It was on my list too! I finally had to give in to the mileage...

Cheers,

Chaz

Check the cabin filter if it has one.

Hey everyone,

I originally bought a '95 LS a year ago...loved it so much and after reading this board, decided to look for a 2000. Was looking everywhere from ebay to Auto Trader for about 3 months but couldn't find what I was looking for.

Silver / Gray interior

Traction control

<50K miles, One owner with full records

<$20,000

Not too much to ask for, right?? Wrong! Seems the 2000 year was getting scarcer and scarcer (probably because of the LS460 arrival) Either they were in an accident or generally looked beaten up.

Last week, while perusing Auto Trader and looking up the VIN in CarFax, I scrolled to the bottom and there was a "Hot Listing" of my eventual baby! Only 43K miles! I went to the dealer that night and got the price down from $24,995 to $21,300 (told the salesman I would not pay a penny over KBB PPY value).

Anyway, it was a little more than I wanted to pay, but the car in in mint condition all the way down to the new car smell. My son gets my '95 and everyone is happy! Lexus and CarFax rocks!

Cheers!