So my GS350 blew its engine last night...
11-20-12, 11:25 AM
#31
Lead Lap
Thread Starter
Well... update time.
I spoke with Lexus, they are willing to pay for parts, I have to pay for Labor. Labor is, with taxes, $3,710
Lexus is also paying for the labor to diagnose the broken engine and take it apart. 35 hours seems insane to me, but, having built numerous engines what do I know anyway?
I am told that they are getting a short block, heads, valves, etc. Basically the short block assembly comes factory built, but they have to build the heads, put it all together, etc.
Regardless, I want to put this whole situation behind me. I didn't get notification about this until Thursday I think it was, so that was close to a month since the car blew up. My girl is outraged beyond belief over this, while this happened the lease expired on her GX, she was waiting to hear the outcome... She has a Q7 now. She wanted to make a federal case about this, personally I just want to wash my hands of it.
This has happened at a HORRIBLE time for me though, that's what really sucks. I make most of my income off of rental properties. After Sandy hit me very hard I decided to be a human and not a Jerk and have a large number of my tenants in hotels (I am not sending people to shelters or throwing them on the street) plus I have crews working to get apartments fixed up asap. This means that my cash reserves are drained, I have no insurance $$ as of yet and I have a HUGE drop in income. Normally $3,700 wouldnt faze me, right now it hit me rather hard.. I pulled 401K money out to cover this as the dealer wouldn't wait 2 weeks for me to get insurance proceeds. So this is actually costing me around $8,000 to fix the car.
No, I am not happy at all right now. Am I pleased that I don't have to pay $18k? I suppose. Am I a happy customer? Heck no.
I spoke with Lexus, they are willing to pay for parts, I have to pay for Labor. Labor is, with taxes, $3,710
Lexus is also paying for the labor to diagnose the broken engine and take it apart. 35 hours seems insane to me, but, having built numerous engines what do I know anyway?I am told that they are getting a short block, heads, valves, etc. Basically the short block assembly comes factory built, but they have to build the heads, put it all together, etc.
Regardless, I want to put this whole situation behind me. I didn't get notification about this until Thursday I think it was, so that was close to a month since the car blew up. My girl is outraged beyond belief over this, while this happened the lease expired on her GX, she was waiting to hear the outcome... She has a Q7 now. She wanted to make a federal case about this, personally I just want to wash my hands of it.
This has happened at a HORRIBLE time for me though, that's what really sucks. I make most of my income off of rental properties. After Sandy hit me very hard I decided to be a human and not a Jerk and have a large number of my tenants in hotels (I am not sending people to shelters or throwing them on the street) plus I have crews working to get apartments fixed up asap. This means that my cash reserves are drained, I have no insurance $$ as of yet and I have a HUGE drop in income. Normally $3,700 wouldnt faze me, right now it hit me rather hard.. I pulled 401K money out to cover this as the dealer wouldn't wait 2 weeks for me to get insurance proceeds. So this is actually costing me around $8,000 to fix the car.
No, I am not happy at all right now. Am I pleased that I don't have to pay $18k? I suppose. Am I a happy customer? Heck no.
11-20-12, 12:44 PM
#33
too bad you have all the other stuff to deal with or I would say have them flat bed the car to you and rebuild it in your free time and they pay for the parts then sell it. best of luck with everything, things will pull thru for your kindness to your renters.
She will like the Q7, did she get the TDI?
She will like the Q7, did she get the TDI?
11-20-12, 02:52 PM
#34
Lead Lap
Thread Starter
This is far from the first round of trouble that I've had with the car, including having to pay for a previous repair that was covered under the factory warranty. When I discussed that with Lexus back in 2010 I was told "we'll, the dealer says its not covered under warranty". Truth be told, I'm somewhat surprised they paid for the parts to be honest.
And yes, she got the TDI... 28 MPG highway plus mega torque, what's not to love?
Now I have to figure out what MY next car is going to be, it was going two be a new GS but right now I'm not so sure.
I'm thinking maybe wait for the TDI A8, maybe an XJ AWD... I never had any interest in an LS, they are way too boring to drive. What's really frustrating to me about this car is that I knew when I bought a Lexus that it wouldn't exactly be as much fun as my Jag or a BMW but that it ought to be bulletproof reliable, so I figured that if I gave up fun I wouldn't have any worries. With the aggravation that this car has caused me... It's enraging.
And yes, she got the TDI... 28 MPG highway plus mega torque, what's not to love?
Now I have to figure out what MY next car is going to be, it was going two be a new GS but right now I'm not so sure.
I'm thinking maybe wait for the TDI A8, maybe an XJ AWD... I never had any interest in an LS, they are way too boring to drive. What's really frustrating to me about this car is that I knew when I bought a Lexus that it wouldn't exactly be as much fun as my Jag or a BMW but that it ought to be bulletproof reliable, so I figured that if I gave up fun I wouldn't have any worries. With the aggravation that this car has caused me... It's enraging.
Last edited by rld14; 11-20-12 at 02:55 PM.
11-20-12, 06:11 PM
#35
Ahhhhh...
The fun with my car continues. We still have the intermittent trans slip, rattling sunroof, and mirrors that are possessed.
But... Now we have a blown engine! Here's the background, I had the valve springs done, car ran ok. Then I had the VVT-I actuator fix done after much fighting with the dealer. After that I noticed low power and lousy gas mileage, I went from getting 26+ on the highway to 23, maybe 24 and the power was down. I complained several times and was told that the campaign caused this and there was nothing that was wrong with the car. Twice I took it back to the dealer and twice I was told it was all in my head.
Schmucks.
So the plan has been, mainly since Lexus NA has blown me off until just last night, to sell or trade it in on probably a Cadillac XTS or maybe just get rid of it as I don't really need it, I have too many cars as it is and I usually drive my antiques unless there's salt on the roads.
So yesterday morning me and a couple of my friends left north jersey at 3:30 am to go to The huge car show in Hershey, PA. The show was awesome buti noticed that the car was struggling to break 22mpg on the trip and averaging 21.7 while cruising at 70-75. I figured it was the extra passengers.
On the way home, just east of Allentown I started hearing a rattling come from under the hood, almost like a squeaky belt. I saw a sign for an exit in 2 miles and figured I'd pull over and check it out. I did check the oil just before the trip and it was fine.
Not 10 seconds later the car started to lose power, the check engine light started flashing, the TRAC and VSC lights came on, the dash said to check TRAC and the car died.
Crap. I pulled over and smoke was pouring from under the hood. The car wasn't overheating either. I tried restarting it and the engine sounded as if it had no compression.
Long story short but AAA and another roadside were useless, I couldn't get the car towed back to a dealer in Jersey and the car, after over 4 hours on the side of I-78 is now outside the gate at Lexus of the Lehigh Valley in Allentown, PA. My best friend drove 110 miles out to pick us up and got us home.
While waiting I sent a frustrated email to, what I can only say is the right person at Lexus, and got a call from the cell phone of someone rather higher up in the food chain. I'm told that this will be handled and they will make it right. Lets see what Lexus of the Lehigh Valley has to say... Their dealerrater.com reviews weren't encouraging but who knows...
Thankfully the car is still under power train warranty....
And to top it all off? I had tickets to the Yankee game that night
The fun with my car continues. We still have the intermittent trans slip, rattling sunroof, and mirrors that are possessed.
But... Now we have a blown engine! Here's the background, I had the valve springs done, car ran ok. Then I had the VVT-I actuator fix done after much fighting with the dealer. After that I noticed low power and lousy gas mileage, I went from getting 26+ on the highway to 23, maybe 24 and the power was down. I complained several times and was told that the campaign caused this and there was nothing that was wrong with the car. Twice I took it back to the dealer and twice I was told it was all in my head.
Schmucks.
So the plan has been, mainly since Lexus NA has blown me off until just last night, to sell or trade it in on probably a Cadillac XTS or maybe just get rid of it as I don't really need it, I have too many cars as it is and I usually drive my antiques unless there's salt on the roads.
So yesterday morning me and a couple of my friends left north jersey at 3:30 am to go to The huge car show in Hershey, PA. The show was awesome buti noticed that the car was struggling to break 22mpg on the trip and averaging 21.7 while cruising at 70-75. I figured it was the extra passengers.
On the way home, just east of Allentown I started hearing a rattling come from under the hood, almost like a squeaky belt. I saw a sign for an exit in 2 miles and figured I'd pull over and check it out. I did check the oil just before the trip and it was fine.
Not 10 seconds later the car started to lose power, the check engine light started flashing, the TRAC and VSC lights came on, the dash said to check TRAC and the car died.
Crap. I pulled over and smoke was pouring from under the hood. The car wasn't overheating either. I tried restarting it and the engine sounded as if it had no compression.
Long story short but AAA and another roadside were useless, I couldn't get the car towed back to a dealer in Jersey and the car, after over 4 hours on the side of I-78 is now outside the gate at Lexus of the Lehigh Valley in Allentown, PA. My best friend drove 110 miles out to pick us up and got us home.
While waiting I sent a frustrated email to, what I can only say is the right person at Lexus, and got a call from the cell phone of someone rather higher up in the food chain. I'm told that this will be handled and they will make it right. Lets see what Lexus of the Lehigh Valley has to say... Their dealerrater.com reviews weren't encouraging but who knows...
Thankfully the car is still under power train warranty....
And to top it all off? I had tickets to the Yankee game that night
I noticed you mentioned you had transmission slips, Can you explain when and how the slips occured. Were you going at high speeds, coming to a stop?
I'm having some issues with my currently but don't know if its the transmission or some kind of break fault.
Mines occures 2 different times
1) When I'm at high speeds 80mph and when I slowly hit the break, I will notice that the rmp will jump out of its normal setting and stay high for a second or two and than drop back to normal. Kind of feel like a weird jerk on the car.
2) When I'm coming to a stop 2-3mph again, the rmp will jump up for a few seconds not allowing me to STOP the car. I will have to slam on the breaks 3-4 times in order to fully stop the car. It feels as though the car still wants to go as my foot is on the break which it continues to move forward with a weird vibration sounds. This all goes away within seconds. The problem is the car won't stop! Not sure if they may be a transmission issue
11-30-12, 07:42 PM
#37
Lead Lap
Thread Starter
I got the car back today. I've been babying it and varying engine speeds during break in, also doing a lot of engine braking to try and seat the rings properly.
HUGE improvement in gas mileage. 30 miles after picking it up, and smelling a little burning oili stopped for gas. Car was 1/2 quart of oil low. Lovely. So I filled it with oil. Another 80 miles and I was home, car is, again, 1/2 qt low.
That was $3,754.05 well spent
HUGE improvement in gas mileage. 30 miles after picking it up, and smelling a little burning oili stopped for gas. Car was 1/2 quart of oil low. Lovely. So I filled it with oil. Another 80 miles and I was home, car is, again, 1/2 qt low.
That was $3,754.05 well spent
12-14-12, 02:11 AM
#38
I have a 06 gs430 and brought it pre owned with 25k miles on it. Now the car has 77k and not one problem with the car beside a rear strut. The first couple years of the 350 motor are really poorly built in my opinion between the yamaha valve springs and the low oil noise during cold start up made me stay clear away from them. I believe the new 350 motors have most of the bugs worked out of them.
Last edited by jwin; 12-14-12 at 02:15 AM.
11-13-13, 06:48 PM
#39
Bringing this thread back to life! Who did you talk to at Lexus that was so helpful? My ex wife just had the engine blow on the IS350, it is at Lexus of Sacramento and they want $9800+ for a used engine with labor. Every cylinder is at 20psi, it is free spinning and dumps coolant.
11-13-13, 09:29 PM
#41
Bringing this thread back to life! Who did you talk to at Lexus that was so helpful? My ex wife just had the engine blow on the IS350, it is at Lexus of Sacramento and they want $9800+ for a used engine with labor. Every cylinder is at 20psi, it is free spinning and dumps coolant.
Look on Car-part.com for a used engine in your area.
Here is a used engine on ebay
http://www.ebay.com/itm/07-08-09-10-11-LEXUS-GS350-ENGINE-3-5L-VIN-E-5TH-DIGIT-2GR-FSE-ENG-AWD-866384-/301005725025?pt=Motors_Car_Truck_Parts_Accessories&hash=item461556dd61&vxp=mtr
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