1995 Lexus LS400 fix log

[Andrew]

I'm making a log for this because why not. It's going to be the slowest log of all time. It does need a lot of work, starting off with replacing the suspension because the FR suspension collapsed due to corrosion and the RR looks like it's about to do the same.

 

It has been sitting for quite a long time now so it will need a lot more than that replaced. I'm going to replace the brakes, engine mounts, suspension bushings, all fluids changed, fuel pump cleaned/replaced, spark plugs replaced, belts replaced and probably much more that I don't know about yet.

[Alex]

Subbed

[Dr. Unicorn]

sub-a-dub-dub three men in a tub

[ENTERPRISE]

I'm making a log for this because why not. It's going to be the slowest log of all time. It does need a lot of work, starting off with replacing the suspension because the FR suspension collapsed due to corrosion and the RR looks like it's about to do the same.

 

It has been sitting for quite a long time now so it will need a lot more than that replaced. I'm going to replace the brakes, engine mounts, suspension bushings, all fluids changed, fuel pump cleaned/replaced, spark plugs replaced, belts replaced and probably much more that I don't know about yet.

 

Pics or it's all a lie ?:vehicle_drive1:

[Andrew]

A few months ago, I paid someone to sort out the area around my car, it would have taken them 10-15 minutes to do it, but "I'll do it later" except it's later now and it hasn't been done so I had to do it. Because of that, taking the wheels off (which should have taken me 15 minutes at most) ended up taking me 2 hours to do because I had to clean all the stuff around the car and dig underneath it a little bit so I could get the jack underneath to lift it up.

 

Anyway, this is the reason why I needed to change the suspension with a reference pic of what it's supposed to look like

 

 

As you can see, the coils of the spring are not supposed to be touching each other. It is actually slightly worrying because it does look like there's tension it in. Not as much as there should be, but there's probably at least a couple hundred kg of tension. Enough to kill someone if it explodes and hits them in the face.

 

Also as soon as I get to the good bits of the work, it starts raining. It wasn't supposed to start raining until 15:00. It actually started raining at 12:30.

Edited January 17, 2020 by Andrew

[ENTERPRISE]

A few months ago, I paid someone to sort out the area around my car, it would have taken them 10-15 minutes to do it, but "I'll do it later" except it's later now and it hasn't been done so I had to do it. Because of that, taking the wheels off (which should have taken me 15 minutes at most) ended up taking me 2 hours to do because I had to clean all the stuff around the car and dig underneath it a little bit so I could get the jack underneath to lift it up.

 

Anyway, this is the reason why I needed to change the suspension with a reference pic of what it's supposed to look like

 

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As you can see, the coils of the spring are not supposed to be touching each other. It is actually slightly worrying because it does look like there's tension it in. Not as much as there should be, but there's probably at least a couple hundred kg of tension. Enough to kill someone if it explodes and hits them in the face.

 

Also as soon as I get to the good bits of the work, it starts raining. It wasn't supposed to start raining until 15:00. It actually started raining at 12:30.

 

Ouch. So has your car been stuck in some overgrowth or something in your back yard ? Just when you mentioned cleaning around your car lol.

[Andrew]

Ouch. So has your car been stuck in some overgrowth or something in your back yard ? Just when you mentioned cleaning around your car lol.

 

Yeah it is or rather was. I don't have a garage, even if I did, it would be too small to reasonably do work in. There are some rental garages down the road from me but they're those ones that are 4.9x2.4m. My car is 5x2m leaving literally less than no room lengthways and about 20cm either side which isn't even enough to open the doors to get in and out of the car. Also they get broken into a lot and have things stolen from them.

[Andrew]

 

All the work I've been able to do today along with pictures of the other coilovers...

[ENTERPRISE]

Ouch. So has your car been stuck in some overgrowth or something in your back yard ? Just when you mentioned cleaning around your car lol.

 

Yeah it is or rather was. I don't have a garage, even if I did, it would be too small to reasonably do work in. There are some rental garages down the road from me but they're those ones that are 4.9x2.4m. My car is 5x2m leaving literally less than no room lengthways and about 20cm either side which isn't even enough to open the doors to get in and out of the car. Also they get broken into a lot and have things stolen from them.

 

I have seen many cars stuck that way (in over growth) but they are usually abandoned haha.

 

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All the work I've been able to do today along with pictures of the other coilovers...

 

Nice, also I love the fact you have the trust tires under the car....just in case those jacks fail on you.

 

[Andrew]

Long post because of images:

 

Day 2:

 

The front brake calliper with a broken iPhone 6 for scale. Note: I've seen supercars with smaller front callipers than this.

 

Also got the broken coilover out.

 

You vs the guy she tells you not to worry about

Slightly annoyed because the new one didn't align properly without needing my persuasion tool.

 

 

Then me realizing it's too long because it was set to the max ride height, I had to take it half out again to lower it

 

Then the final two pictures, one at the top mounting point and the final (sort of) thing

 

 

I'm having trouble getting the upper wishbone back in. One side is half way in but it somehow got stuck. I can't be bothered to deal with it now so I'll probably sort it out tomorrow.

 

At least I can say My Summer Car has taught me everything I know about doing this sort of thing. Mostly just doing a terrible job and being able to swear in fluent Finnish.

[ENTERPRISE]

You vs the guy she tells you not to worry about

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That killed me lol. Those calipers are beastly though...could stop a tank by the looks of things haha

[Andrew]

Last update until the start of March hopefully. I just put the one in for now because I wanted to test ride height and stiffness of the spring as I did go stiffer than stock. Stock was really soft and floaty, I wanted something that felt a bit more solid. Stiffness by my estimate is about 20% more than stock which is exactly what I wanted so that's good. The other reason why I put just the one in for now is because I'll have to take them apart in the near future anyway. It has the factory (1995) bushings still, I can take chunks off using my fingernails which is a serious safety hazard and I'm pretty sure would be an automatic MOT failure.

 

Anyway, here's pics + interior pics that I never really got before. With the exception of the driver seat and climate control LCD, I've not seen an interior that's in as good condition as mine with the exception of one that I saw that was basically bought brand new, driven to storage and left there until a couple of years ago when they sold it.

 

[Supercrumpet]

submarine

[ENTERPRISE]

While I cannot get a close up, it looks like those leather seats have done well considering there age..no obvious cracking etc.

[Andrew]

Got some new wheels. Fronts don't fit because the brakes are way too big, will have to get spacers. Didn't have time to see if they'll fit on the rear but I'm 99% sure they won't be a problem.

 

 

While I cannot get a close up, it looks like those leather seats have done well considering there age..no obvious cracking etc.

 

Yeah, it's hard to believe it's 25 years old.

[ENTERPRISE]

Careful with those locking nuts, I have had a few people with issues of rust meaning they get jammed. I am sure it is more than likely not going to happen but they can be a bugger if they go wrong.

[Andrew]

Careful with those locking nuts, I have had a few people with issues of rust meaning they get jammed. I am sure it is more than likely not going to happen but they can be a bugger if they go wrong.

 

I'm going to replace them with normal nuts eventually, those are just for the mean time. I don't like how they look and AFAIK you can't get covers for them. I do want to get covers for them as the silver nuts with dark grey wheels looks terrible. Either that, or paint them with rubberised paint.

 

Didn't have much time to work on the car over the last few days, just 30-45 minutes total. I did manage to get the bottom half of the rear seat out which is surprisingly heavy at 17.4kg.

 

 

I did think changing the front struts was going to be more difficult than the rear, but it turns out it's not. In order to get access to the top of the rear struts, I need to remove the rear parcel shelf. To remove the rear parcel shelf, I need to remove the C pillar covers. To remove the C pillar covers, I need to remove the top half of the rear seats. To remove the top half of the rear seats, I need to remove the bottom half of the rear seats.

 

Removing the bottom half of the seats wasn't too much of a problem, just 4 clips holding it in place. Easy to remove but I don't think it's going to be too easy to get back properly as you need to position the seat just right. I did find some neat things under it though like a key that has Italian on it as well as a mint condition penny from 1995. This job is a lot bigger than I thought it would be. It is a good opportunity to have a look at the fuel filter, fuel pump and general condition of the fuel tank as the access to all of those things is under the rear seat.

 

Removing the top half of the seat is more of a pain. It's held in with bolts, I've removed all but one of the bolts without any issues. The one bolt that's stuck does turn, but it doesn't come out I have tried prying on it with a screw driver while using the ratchet to remove the bolt with no luck. I then tried just yanking it out with worse than no luck because I bent the bracket. No big deal though because I can just bend it back.

 

I did damage the parcel shelf as well, it's made of sound insulation, MDF and carpet. I did slightly break the MDF but that's not really a problem as you won't be able to tell once it's put back properly. Could be worse though, a lot of rear parcel shelves on sedans are made of plastic and if you break those, you pretty much need to replace them if you care about it not being damaged.

 

I do have to remove the driver seat as well as there is a loose bolt or something in the backrest that needs to be fixed. It did get an MOT advisory for it, but since then the MOT has changed to be a lot stricter, especially on old cars. They made these changes because "we need to make sure these cars are safer than ever" but I have a sneaking suspicion they made it a lot stricter to get people to dump their old, inefficient, polluting cars and replace them with newer cars that have lower emissions. Having a check engine light on is an automatic failure these days which is a useless metric to go on because that could mean anything from "your engine is about to explode" to "it's time to replace the air filter".

 

Since I'm taking out the rear seat as well as driver seat, I might as well remove the front passenger seat and detail the interior properly as I don't think I'll have this opportunity again. Although going on the carpet that was under the rear seat that hasn't seen the light of day since it was installed in 1995, the carpet for the whole of the interior is in near enough brand new condition. Or at least was until I covered it in mud.

 

I am currently storing interior parts inside my house. As a result, the entirety of upstairs now smells like Lexus interior.

[ENTERPRISE]

Certainly a long process but will be well worth it. You are right about the MOT rules, much stricter and I am under the same impression that it is more about getting people to move on to greener vehicles than safety. The check engine light is a dumb thing as well, luckily you can reset those with an OBD2 Handheld, not sure if you car has an OBD2 port or not but even without there is usually a trick to reset the engine light using a combination or startups while holding in the clutch. That is obviously just an example but I would imagine there is a trick for it if you don't have an OBD2 port.

[speed_demon]

Now I see why the ES300 guys say to just do the LS400 caliper & rotor swap and never have to worry about brake issues again. They bolt right up to my Avalon too.

 

Looks like the Lexus is moving along nicely

[Dr. Unicorn]

you should get a car that works such as a 2020 toyota corolla

[Andrew]

you should get a car that works such as a 2020 toyota corolla

 

How many doors have you replaced on your car?

[ENTERPRISE]

 

How many doors have you replaced on your car?

 

[Simmons]

Damn :lachen:

[Andrew]

Weather next week does look pretty good, so I'll probably try to get the rear suspension changed if nothing goes wrong. I do need to try and take the interior apart without damaging any of it. I still have to get that one stuck bolt out. I haven't worked out how I'm going to do it yet.

[ENTERPRISE]

Where are the sexy car pics ?