dropspace

I have been trying to nail down a problem with my 92 that has so far stumped me. if i lay on the gas the engine will hesitate and surge slightly until the tach hits 4k rpm. then it takes off with a sudden jolt of power. it only does this if you are accelerating heavily (like over 50% down on the accelerator) the problem is more pronounced when the engine has not fully warmed up but still exists at operating temp. it exists at any grade of fuel. i ran 3 tanks of each grade in it with no difference. my car has a new air filter, new plugs, new wires, new fuel filter. the tranny and gearbox were flushed 5k miles ago and the car shifts fine. it has 103k miles on it. i want to take it to a dealer and see if hooking it up to the computer will shed any light on the situation. but I don't want to get suckered into "lets try this out" and have the situation not change. to me it seems like it may be running rich. the only things i can think of are leaks in the intake (which i have inspected and can see nothing obvious) or perhaps the valves need to be adjusted. but thats all i can come up with. any ideas?

i have registered about 4 out of cali state cars in my life and they all passed. when you get it tested they will know from the vin that it is an out of state car and does not have the CA only emissions equpment. they can't really require that you put that stuff on your car so they just charge you a one time fee to register out of state cars there and allow you to pass at higher emission levels. (this fee may have been revoked, i havent lived in CA for awhile and heard from someone its gone now)

my 92 has bosch 21" and 19"'s on it and they fit fine. so i am guessing your wiper arms are out of whack

the fuel filter is under the hood on the driver side near the wheel well. metal fuel line goes out the bottom down to the fuel rail and the top has a flexible tube leading to the fuel intake. you need to put a wrench on the bottom nut before you take it off or you run the risk of rupturing the fuel line. there is a silt filter in the tank on the 92 es so the fuel filter doen't have to filter much. but its an easy fix so you might as well try it and see if it helps.

my 92 came with red when i bought it, flushed it to green. temp stays solid as a rock with either. I saw no difference...

they are completely different cars. 92 was a total redesign for the camry line which is what es's are based on. different body, engine, interior, everything...

there are usually piles of people dumping stock rims on ebay to purchase aftermarket ones...I would try there.

Imp. Gallons are "Imperial Gallons" which the US doesn't use my fuel light comes on with about 15 gallons in the tank, that to me this is a little early...but running out of gas in a modern car is very hard on the cat and engine. I don't go by the gauge anyway, I know the range of my car and just look at the trip meter.

as I am one of the people here that deals with the rediculous placement of the oil filter on gen1 and 2 es's I thought I would share this: just bought an 04 4Runner (mostly due to the fact that I LOVE my lexus) and noticed that on the 4.0L v6 at least, the oil filter is right on the top drivers side of the engine. It could not be easier to get to....and they also have it in a little funnel shaped oil catcher which is angled up so the oil that does come out just goes right back down into the oil filter hole. that is the easiest filter change setup I have ever seen on any car! hopefully with a new toyota, thats all I will have to deal with for a long time

its a common problem with this engine unfortunately. this would be a relatively painless process except for the back valve cover. they are impossible to get to unless you pull the intake off completely. sometimes having a straight 6 has advantages i guess... you might want to check a toyota dealer instead of a lexus one. they will most likely be cheaper.

check some local salvage yards to see if they have a trim matching one. i could be wrong, but i am guessing all the 92-96 and 97-01 seatbelts are the same. 92-01 may even all be the same. they are very simple to replace. just pop out the trim on the b pillar.

man, i don't think i ever put the key in the lock on my 92 maybe i wont try it now :o

search the archives..i believe someone else asked about the front turn signal bulb change not too long ago. as far as filters...how would you be able to judge how well a filter performs? and how would you define a filter as doing a "bad job"? more of a question for my benefit. my opinion is that it is more important to change your oil and filter when its supposed to be done rather than getting caught up on some specific filter brand. these arent high performance racing engines...

you use the fuel gauge? i have never found any fuel gauge to be very accurate. i just use the trip meter and reset it every time. i know how many miles i can safely get on a tank...

wow, avoid volkswagens i guess...sheesh!

any standard input on a head unit is already analog... the cd changer has a digital to analog converter on it. unless you have some kind of setup that actually runs a digital cable to the head unit (i.e. optical cable or digital coax), but i doubt (i could be wrong here) that a stock stereo, even a lexus one, would do that. BUT the casette setup does sound worse than just running the line into the head unit mainly because of the fact that it has to run through the play head of a tape mechanism. i run an ipod through the casette and I find it to be pretty good. if you jack the volume up high you can hear the typical hiss from a tape deck, but while the music is playing it sounds fine. better than any actual casette tape could sound I am sure. actually for those with an ipod, the ashtray on a gen1 es300 makes a great ipod caddy! it just takes some small mods and some black weatherstripping and you have yourself a handy popout ipod caddy that even gets lighted when the headlights are on of course you couldn't use it as an ashtray then, but I don't smoke...

if your disks had play in them, i would stop driving the car as the wheel keeps the rotors tight. so if the rotor was loose your wheel would most likely be ready to fall off there are 2 bolts that hold the caliper in place and are easy to get to if you take the wheel off. it might be worth it to just jack the car up and see if you see anything odd with it. you could be taking some real risks driving with it as is... btw the statement about hot rotors coming in contact with water is correct. I had an issue with my calipers not relelasing when the brakes let up causing the pads to rub on the rotors constantly. they were getting so hot i couldnt touch the wheel. I hit a big puddle one morning on the way to work and they warped badly almost instantly. I have since fixed the stuck calipers and actually got the rotors turned and the pads replaced for free. I happened to get the lifetime warranty on the parts when i bought them.. :D

for the early models, dexIII is fine. they no longer make dexII so your choices are kind of limited. my 92 was flushed and refilled with dexIII and its running fine.

it is possible to include the xm radio ouputs into the inputs for the cd changer also. there is a kit out on the web somewhere that accomplishes this, i don't have the link anymore though. do some googling and you will find it. it looks to me like they just mix the signal into the input for the changer. I don't think you loose the changer audio, they just both play on the same inputs so you will have to remember to stop the cd player if you want to listen to xm. btw, the fm modulators have problems too. they can cut out at times especially in urban areas where there are strong radio signals. i opted to just use the cassette adapter even though its messy.

it may have to do with the fact that cars they sell in califiornia have to be, in amlost every case, special cars because of the emissions restrictions there. since the orders going into cali are handled differently at the factory, they may just use that line as a test bed for other options rather than put then on the 49 state models that go out to the rest of the country. so you folks in cali get to be guinea pigs

look on the passenger side of the engine just under the intake. you will see a white valve coming out of the engine. it pops out, although you may have to get some pliers on it to pull it out.

the water pump is driven by the timing belt, so unless you are extrmely confident in your mechanical abilities, I would take it to a good shop to have it looked at. you can really mess up an engine with a screwed up timing belt change...

they will with state farm if you got your license at 16. the clock starts when you get your license. 9+ years driving is a different rate category. when i got married i had just been driving for 9 years and got the marriage reduction plus the 9 year thing all at once. my rate went down by half in one month

reset your trip meter when you fill up when you get gas again, put how many miles are in the trip meter in your calculator, and divide by how many gallons of gas you put in the tank to refill it. miles/gallons

i get 350mi on a tank with premium in my 92. but it depends a lot on your driving style and what type of conditions you are driving in.