Zodiackill

Hey there guys! So, this is my first post on this forum. My 2001 Acura TL crapped out after 178k miles on it, and this weekend my parents just purchased me a 2007 Lexus Es350, 35k miles on it, to replace it. Awesome condition, certified, yada yada. It's the charcoal gray color, not sure Lexus's technical term for it. Mica something or another I think? Anyway, it is an absolutely GORGEOUS car. And I am beyond ecstatic with it. First off, I'm a 21 year old college kid, so having my parents buy me something like this was basically out of the realm of possibility in my mind. However when they told me they got it I was floored. Anyway, that brings up my next point, as a 21 year old college senior, hopefully going into medical school in the next 1-2 years, I don't personally have a whole lot of extra funding to put into the car. However, I do definitely want to make some changes to it.

Rather than buying a lot of new equipment for the exterior I figure I may do some Plasti-dip on the exterior. Just some smaller stuff, like on the grille I'd change the cross bars to matte black, leave the emblem and surrounding edge chrome. I believe I just have 17" wheels, 7 spoke. I'd do those in matte black, but tape off certain area's so it's got certain portions of the silver remaining. Just to make those look pretty sick without dropping a lot of money on new wheels. Then a little chrome door trim and window pillars. Eventually I'd also like to get some 8000k HID's in the headlamps and foglights, with some LED DRL's if possible. Then paint the backing in the headlamps black for a clean look with the other black on it. An absolute must is window tinting, but I'd pay for top quality tint which I'm thinking will be around 450. I have to park outside at school, so anything to block heat/sunlight and preserve leather is a must have. Which I believe higher quality tint helps with from what I've read here.

That's at least the plan for the first portion of changes on the vehicle. My second wave of changes will be the interior, which I'd need to pay for most of it to have done. I've been largely inspired by sick350's thread where he swapped the interior LED's, put in the double DIN adapter and alpine system, and the illuminated door sills. I'd try doing it on my own, but I'm a novice working on cars and dont trust myself to do these things. I'd rather pay the shop in my current town to have it done, and they specialize in interior modifications so I should be okay there.

My hope is to have most of this done in 3-4 years(funding being the main limitation haha). I'll probably drive this car into the ground until I have a stable career and can afford another luxury car haha, so I'd like it to be a touch more personalized than stock. Anywho, if you guys have any helpful information for me, or advice it'd be awesome! Like I said, I'm a novice at anything with cars, never did anything to my Acura because I figured it wouldn't last long enough. So I'm definitely just starting to mess around in the car world and am open to any suggestions. Thanks!

ChristianM

Congrats on your lexus! I can completely understand how you feel, I'm also a 23yo college student and have poured alot of my time and money into my car. In terms of mods, the first thing i would recommend is the tints. It makes the car look alot better IMO and isnt too expensive. The only downside of the tints is that the rearview autodimming feature doesn't work as well as it does without tinit's on the car. For LED's, all 4 doors are 194 bulbs are fairly inexpensive to change, as well as the front/rear parking lights and reverse lights. I would start with that.

As for the deck, it will be one of the most time consuming and expensive portions of your install. I have spent maybe 3000 on my install and it is very basic. Besides the cost of the headunit, the fitting kit and all the other accessories to get it installed and retain the steering wheel controls will probably cost you around 300-400. If you do decide to go with an aftermarket sub and amp, your looking at at least 60-100 in extra wiring for the amp and such.

It is a very nice looking car but sadly not the easiest to mod. Hopefully ill post pics of everything ive done in a few days after i get the car all cleaned up and the rain stops. Also, regarding the HID's, be sure to install a relay for the headlights and foglights. If not, they will constantly flicker on startup if they're on and it will severly reduce bulb life. I blew my first headlight blub in just over a year and 1 of my fogs just went out after replacing the headlight. Just an FYI.

Good luck.

John U

Buy a can of good wax, use it regularly and call it good!

Robert_J

I cover the audio upgrade in detail on one of my threads. It's easy even for a novice. Pulling off the first panel can be a little nerve racking but after that one, you get the feel for it and the others pop right off.

Do like I did and the wiring for the head unit is done well before tearing into the car. My install was a lot of trial and error with the install kit because no one had ever posted instructions. Follow mine and ask as many questions as you need.

Keeping the steering wheel controls costs $85 and the radio to amp adapter is $99. Post #5 in my thread. The wiring for the sub was was under $30 and it is more than adequate for a 1,000 class D amp. The wiring kit was from Wal-Mart and the RCA cables from Monoprice.

Here's my thread - https://www.clublexus.com/forums/es3...-a-2007-a.html