SOMEONE ELSE'S GOT MY NAME

Holy ancient threads! :P Our So Cal home is 20-ish minutes away from the New Port Beach Lexus dealership and the Flecher Jones boys. Not too many years ago the lovely folks of NPB (including FJ mercedes) sponsered an international airport in "our" backyard (meaning the surrounding cities of Laguna Beach, Laguna Hills, Irvine, Lake Forest, Mission Viejo, Laguna Niguel, Laguna Woods, and Aliso Viejo). Big Money NPB did NOT win that war. But the hard feelings remain. None of our surrounding cities has any impovrished areas ... by a long shot. We simply out spent them, and leagally out manuvered them. It took years of legal manuvering and spending. That said, I'd push our Lexus home before doing business with anyone in NPB. Well, actually, I'd call triple 'A' :P But driving down Pacific Coast Highway (pch) we've seen the dealership. No big deal. Like most all older cities, NPB has its skuzzy areas too, as well as over-priced ones. That's one of the nice things about living in NPB's surrounding cities ... newer planned community/cities. New cities literally plan bad areas out of existence. You don't have to drive too far down PCH before you get away from the hoyty-toytie areas, near the NPB Lexus dealership, or FJ Mercedes ... or the Ferarri delership ... or the Lambo dealership, etc. But a huge chunck of the NPB Lexus dealership is just the cost of being where it is. NPB land in that area, even in these depressed times is horribly expensive. With the devaluation since that article came out? I'll bet NPB Lexus is really hurting. Our Lexus replaced a big'ol land barge Range Rover. 13mpg. Oh boy. Unreliability, and over-priced too. What a combo. The Range Rover dealerships around here have all the fancy junk too (both NPB as well as the one in Mission Viejo). It just comes with the territory of being in a pricy area. Anyway, the Lexus Dealerships (NPB as well as others) GM dealers, Chrysler, etc ... they're ALL hurting now. When the Markets open tomorrow, it'll be quite a ride ... and the overpriced Dealerships of NPB? We'll see. But seeing how the economy has changed since Lexus made its plans to break ground (over three years back) ... you only know Lexus wouldn't have gone to all the expense if they could have had a crystal ball showing October 2008.

Ours is a 2006 too, but we bought our used 400h in '06. Didn't yours come w/ the manual? (when all else fails, read the directions :P ) You model's DVD holder may be different than some others because (I believe) differing options (like rear headrest DVD screens) means the player may be located in varying spots. Ours is in the lower rear compartment, under the carpet, to the right. I'd start there.

Grain fuel isn't something you just simply convert to, as you would convert a naturally asperated 1976 chevy van to propane. Grain fuel (high percentage) is corosive, so you have to replace a lot of parts to overcome that issue. Then there's the issue of very few E85 filling stations. That's the good part. E85 was a scam invented by GM to make their worse gas guzzlers (suburban, tahoe, Yukon, ad infinitum) look better. You see, if (this is just an easy to understand example not reflective or actual percentages) for example your 16mpg guzzler uses a 50/50 mix of gas alcohol, you only have to count the gas towards fed mpg standards. Thus, your 16mpg guzzler went 16 miles on only 1/2 a gallon of gas! (wink wink) ... so your getting 32mpg. sounds unbelievable, but true. so when you add those fleet vehicles into the mix of the straight gas burners, it pulls their over-all fuel economy up. If that isn't pathetic, it gets worse. You see, you straigh gas burner that got 16mpg? When you DO find a E85 station? You'll only get maybe 14mpg . . . 20% worse fuel economy. so now you know why even those vehicles that CAN run E85 ... they don't. Gotta love it.

Please excuse me . . . I hope you don't mind if I forgo holding my breath, and hop on one leg, while I wait for the increadible growth ... and the party. History always repeats itself. There was a time when everyone wanted to be Roman, too. Just prior to the dark ages. Some say it won't be that bad 'next time'. I at least go that far. Dude, what? Don't worry amigo, I doubt you'll be invited anyway..... by the way....the sky is falling, the sky is falling. We're all going to die too, the world will burn, disease is everywhere, we're all going to kill ourselves. The sun is going to scorch our kids to death, my son's puppy will be eaten by a wolf, life sucks, it's all bad, we're all doomed, except for you thanks to your solar panels and hybrid cars. Go read a history book, followed by a few courses in economics 101 and finance 101. First, I didn’t mean to get anyone’s feelings hurt, by stating via a humor statement (hoping on one leg), so I ask your forgiveness for any offense taken. My opinion was meant to be delivered in a neutral manner … not condescending. That said ... although my Doctor’s degree is in law, my bachelor’s degree WAS in business … so I have had econ 101, and a bunch more. History is/was my favorite subject though, actually. Anywho, there are a ton more economists on the ‘down’ view, than there are on the ‘up’ view, so they stand in the majority. I'm not refering to the johnny-come-lately predictions, but rather the economists that base their views off of decades of data. And at the beginning of October 1929 one could have ‘poo poo’d the storm clouds on the horizon. Time proved those doom & gloom sayers true. I merely point out that not too long after many predicted glorious times a few weeks ago … and a few months ago … that the future WILL unfold in a manner corresponding to how our economy has been run for the last 75 years. For those that think it’s going to be a party? Again, I merely think that time will tell. No hard feelings?

Please excuse me . . . I hope you don't mind if I forgo holding my breath, and hop on one leg, while I wait for the increadible growth ... and the party. History always repeats itself. There was a time when everyone wanted to be Roman, too. Just prior to the dark ages. Some say it won't be that bad 'next time'. I at least go that far.

Agreed. The 1st 7 - 9 miles are the worst. Then again, as you said above, the same poor startup mpg is true for straight fuel burners. The sollution for us was installing the electric block heater (ebh). Not only does it benefit in the cold northern winters, using it in the summer keeps those first few miles nice and high. You plug the ebh into a timer that runs for 90 minutes prior to departing and you're good to go, mpg wise. I know it's not a perfect sollution if you don't have 110v access where you park, but for the other 80%-90% of Toyota/Lexus hybrid owners, it helps.

Lockpick has nothing to do with Ipod connectivity. It just let's you enter a new Nav destination and use the cellphone via bluetooth (not sure if that is for all models and generations) while the vehicle is moving. 2006 RX has Gen. 4 Nav. You do not need lockpick to use a bluetooth cell phone. As long as you dial the number from the cell, or use the voice dial the cell will work fine while the car is moving. The lock pick I had still required you to stop the car to dial usig the NAV screen First, Lockpick DOES have something to do w/ Ipod connectivity. The ULTIMATE LOCKPICK can TURN ON YOUR VIDEO AND AUDIO INPUTS for use with Video iPOD without the need for adapters. Second, You DO need lockpick to use a bluetooth cell phone ... IF you want to dial your entry right off the MFD, while in motion. That's the main thing of greatness with the lockpick ... you don't HAVE to reach for your phone, and then read tiney buttons on the phone to dial (while watching traffic), or scroll thru the phone's database on who to dial. The Lexus' MFD screen is WAY easier to read for dialing ... both screen buttons, and data base saved phone books. In fact, if you have the older Lexus that lets you bring up map inputs via entering through the maintenance screen, there really IS no reason you'd want a lockpick, except for the phone entry on the fly.

Thanks! Unfortunately, they don't offer any products for the RX. Perhaps in the future? You're not yet out of alternatives. If you're savy on the PC (or know someone who is), you can custom write your own DVD, containing the older software loading files, and containing the new map data. What that gives you is a DVD that'll work with the lockpic. It works. It's what we've done. The thread is here, just do a search. Good luck!

What we did for our winter tires was to go down to the local big O and buy matching sized ugly steel to mount our studs on. They'll gladly tell you what'll match your existing offset & height.

. . . or, you could simply solve the problem like me. Drive in the buff! :D That might create it's own set of problems :P on a more serious note, WELCOME to the group ChrisRX400h. We use this: http://www.equishopper.com/p-4401-moss-goa...addle-soap.aspx because the better half is way sensitive to the chemicle fragrence stench added to most cleaners/conditioners.

The Premium warranty we bought takes our car out to 100,000 miles. So when you say they wouldn't fix it, my 1st thought was, "hugh?" Our MFD went flakey & they took it right in, gave us a free rental, and the next day we were good to go. Anyway, after a couple claims? The warranty paid for itself. saying "don't get the warranty" is like saying, save your money and don't buy fire insurance for your house. Great idea, until the place burns to the ground. It all turns on how much risk you want to afford.

Replace the entire system? What could possily be broken beyond repair? Lexus will replace the component and send it out for repair, Then use the repaired component for the next customer with problems. First . . . . WELCOME to the group ! ! soooo .... there you are, at the dealer ... 48K mile minimum warranty ... dealer says it'll be replaced. And why is it you left without having them replace it? We had the MFD replaced on our other car. It was 'rebuilt' ... they took the old one out be sent off for re-solder, and the swap out took less than an hour. Heck, I've taken the radio out of our 400h just to put the bluetooth over-ride 'lockpick' in. A shloemoe like me was able to get the radio out and back in, in less than an hour. So it's no big deal.

I yack w/ a few folks in the UK on amateur radio. They say it hs come down to (after converting liters & pound sterling) a measly $9/gallon. Cheep at twice the price. :P

Growth (so that debt can be paid off / paid down eventually, by the next generation) IS necessary. But growth only comes from cheep energy. If you believe the earth's center is a creamy nouget-filled ball of fuel, then I guess continued growth is possible. But otherwise ? . . . .

Is your Lexus 'Pre-Bluetooth' ? IOW, what's wrong w/ the car's own bt setup. We find that works decent enough. Let's see ... your avatar shows '2003' model so I don't know. Our '04 Toyota has it so maybe i'm being presumptuous.

Are you saying the 400h can't have Nav w/out having a backup camera? Or do you mean you PERSONALLY wouldn't be w/out both. After all, the MFD is installed regardless of Nav. All the backup camera needs is the MFD. The Nav & backup camera are completely independent, so you COULD have one w/out the other. Yep, the Garmin simply tells you, "off route .... recalculating" when you go the wrong way.

Sure, bail 'em out ... why not ... what else can we do. And how does the fed do that? It prints more play money. What does more printed money do? It takes away value that the rest of us have in our savings. That's the nature of inflation & it's been going on now for decades. Compounding and then compounding of the compounding. The tital wave is coming. History always repeats itself & the U.S. will eventually face the same as every other country with worthless money ... backed only by a belief that it has value. You can wonder why all the water just rushed out of the bay, or you can do something else before the 75 foot wave comes rushing back in.

Wow, I've never heard of a dealer 'skipping' a year. So then, will they just keep making 2008's in the mean time? Until the early 2010's arrive? Or will the story heard by i.L.L.2007 pan out to be the real deal?

I'm not wanting to have to talk to those crazy sales people. I know some of the 2009 Toyota hybrids have been delivered, but haven't yet seen / heard anything yet regarding the 400h. I'd really like to see what the dash looks like on the 2009, now that the SKS is finally integrated (supposedly) into it. Anybody? Edit: Wow, it's been 24 hours, & nothing ... where's all those folks that absolutely have to get the latest & greatest? :P

The dealer will tell you there's a more important issue to consider. Several have sought to replace the 400h's wheels w/ RX330 rims (for chrome, for instance). The dealer says the RX330 rims aren't designed to take the extra load / torque of the HSD.

Glad you said reasonable, 'at the lexus dealer'. Reasonable turns on what you want to spend :P Ok, here's the link again ... this is from a Toyota certified hybrid tech: http://priuschat.com/forums/care-maintenan...-you-don-t.html Mind you, this is what your rig NEEDS ... it's not want Lexus WANTS, because their wants are mainly your money. Follow the NEEDS, and there can be no issue upon warranty claim. As previously said, you can always spend more money ... double, triple or higher ... and the Lexus service people DO need to send their kids to college. :D For me, this means over the last 4 years, I've had to spend for 2 alignments ($250 total) 8 oil changes ($176.50 total) and in 25K miles, I'll have to spend $12 to self install a PCV valve. The RX's HSD system costs a bit more up front, but needs WAY less maintenance then our previous Range Rover. Money in our pockets!

That's right. Fact is, even the brake fluid is manufactured to easily last 3X longer than "dealer recomendations". But heck, the dealer needs to send their kids to college too :P I posted a link not too long ago. (sigh) I'll try & find it ... again.

Driving bliss to me: http://aptera.com/ Sweet! I'm # 1,251 on the wait list ... just a few more months!

No eye rolling here. Even regarding "know one can know how much oil there is yet to be discovered" ... as my link shows. Consider also that Hubbert died some years ago, so he wasn't able to comment on the subsequent "facts". Not speculation, peak oil facts. 3 parts. A, B, & C. Check it out, and tell me it isn't sobering: http://www.chrismartenson.com/peak_oil Bottom line, the national or world price for power will continue, now and then (after major runups), to drop a half a buck or euro dollar per gallon or litre now and then. That's not the point. It's what's ahead, and how far off we are, with our date with destiny, and how subtle or quicik it hits. BTW, our So. Cal. home's 7.9KKW Photo panel system will be completed in less than 2 weeks. I predict that the 'premium' we're paying for this power will pay for itself in less than 5 years. It's all about how long ago production peaked ... not how many more pools we hope to find. ;)

We find that the vsc/trac does better running winter tires, simply because it's likely the system will have to deal with wheel spin a whole lot less, because you'll have better traction on the frosty roads As to mileage? MPG's drop when you're on ice / snow / freezing winter weather anyway, when operating a hybrid. Cold / freezing weather is not optimum conditions for the main traction battery. You're simply not driving in ideal mpg weather in the winter, so the fact that you're not driving on "high mpg tires" instead of studs/snow tires is a moot point. When we had our Ford Exploader 4x4 we got about 15% worse mpg's on ice/freezing conditions with studs ... and yes, we were better off each winter changing over to winter tires. Now we have the 400h. We get about 15% worse mpg's on ice/freezing conditions ... and yes, we're better off changing to winter tires in the frosty season(s). Did we "have to" change either? No. Better off? you bet.