jtrue28

Whats even worse is they want to charge like $1000 if you want to replace the battery with the same Panasonic battery from the factory. Seems like a "top notch" battery like that shouldn't be having these problems.

rjm

Are you sure about that? I've replaced the battery in an older Lexus and it was only about $100, and Lexus did the labor.

kh4nh

Hi guys,
I am having the same problem as well. Bought my GS 350 AWD 2 months ago and barely has 1K miles on it. Left the car parked and locked for 5 days and found the battery dead, key fob more than 3 ft from car, proximity did not work, remote unlock did not work, had to open the door manually with the key. I am sure car was in parked and everything was locked. If this turns out to be a Lexus problem I am going to rage. I posted on the Lexus Facebook site and sent a note to the salesmen...lets see what they say. Very surprised that this is a common problem.

I do have the iPhone 5 charger plugged in, but not plugged to the phone. Is it possible the cable is somehow draining the battery? Anyone else have had this problem without any charger cables plugged in?

Outrage

This is how I've observed auto manufacturers deal with issues with their cars:

1. Deny
2. Deny
3. Deny
4. NHTSA opens an investigation in ot the fault
5. Deny
6. NHTSA finds the fault
7. Admit the fault and fix the problem

GM11

Yeah well the Lexus brand is all about reliability so it must all be our fault. So kh4nh is the 13th person to report the issue, just on this forum so there must be a lot more and Lexus will have this all logged. I'm a quiet guy, I don't post on forums like this (enjoy reading the posts from you guys though!) but this is really bad. I don't expect a fix straight away, just an acknowledgement that they are even looking at the issue would make me happy (or happier anyway). So far I have had "are you sure your wife didn't leave the lights on" rolling eyes. No, I drove it last. "Oh... maybe you left any interior light on, is that possible?". No. "Hmmm, well we have never heard of this happening, maybe it's a one off, etc".

In fairness they did want to keep my car overnight and have one of their supertechs review everything in the morning, but I needed the car back for the next day (one car family). I did offer to take it back on Saturday but they politely declined, so here we are with me holding my breath each time my wife or I press the starter button.

It may be incredibly difficult to solve (if not unsolvable) but they will do more damage to their brand and reputation for reliability by pretending this isn't happening and hoping it goes away.

Look, I love Lexus and want them to succeed and I love my 4GS but gee I have a 9am board meeting in London ON next month that I cannot be late for. It's a 2hr drive and normally I'd leave home at 6.45. But now I'm thinking, but what if the car does not start? Should I hitch a ride the day before with my colleague in his Ford Focus to ensure I don't miss this meeting

kh4nh

So just an update guys.
1) Turns out my 19 yo nephew who moved my car pressed the start/stop button twice and so the car was on ACC mode. With that said, the car is supposed to shut off after 15 minutes in Acc mode (I've seen this myself). So for whatever reason this did not happen.
2) Called Lexus Roadside Assistance. The tech that came jumped the battery, I tried to start the car and nothing happened but the sound of the starter cranking hard. This happened twice. The tech decided the battery was totally dead and gave me a fresh battery. The original battery said "Panasonic" on the side and is made of clear translucent plastic (pretty cool). The replacement I got was a black battery with "Lexus" on it (looks like the one from my 2000 ES300). Car starts up fine now.
3) Lexus did not acknowledge anything on Facebook and merely gave me a link to Roadside Assitance. I asked the tech if he had seen similar problems and he said none before. Go figure.

varcity64

iTrader: (2)

i am not on CL like i used to be, so i dont read every post and i missed this one. you can add me to the list of folks this has happened to. i purchased my vehicle may of 2012 and everything was great. then one morning after 5-6 months of ownership, the car was completely dead. called lexus road-side and they sent a truck to jump the car. the guy struggled to get the car started as it took 7 or 8 attempts and trying different methods before the car started. i drove the car right to the dealership and told them i wasnt leaving without a loaner since i couldnt be certain it would start after if i shut it off. got a call from the dealer and was told the battery was completely drained and they believed there was a "short" in the battery. i never heard of this, but they gave me a new battery and i havent had a problem since. clearly mine wasnt an isolated incident as i had originally thought, so there must be a real problem

CincyBrad

This isn't isolated to Lexus, many upper end cars have this problem now. The more electronic systems on the car, the higher battery drain. Many of these systems do not shut off totally, they just switch into a low drain mode. Battery technology really hasn't advanced much in the last 20 years, while vehicle electronics have, kind of just the way it is, sadly. A friend has an S550, if he doesn't drive the car for 2-3 days, it's as dead as a door nail. Same with some BMW's I know.

GM11

As an experiment I thought I would see whether I could replicate this.

After filling her up (always get gas before doing anything my father always used to say I drove home, put the car in the garage and with music playing from my iPod (Adore by the Smashing Pumpkins in case anyone cares) pushed the start button twice. The car turned off completely then turned on again in ACC mode with the music playing, pretty much as I would have expected.

I then left the car. As soon as I opened the driver door an audible alarm sounded continuously (beep beep beep) accompanied by a yellow flashing warning light on the dash. This would have been difficult to ignore but I did anyway of course in the interests of science and I got out of the car closing the door. The yellow light continued to flash and the music kept playing (not sure whether the beeping continued once I left the car, I can't remember and I didn't have a clipboard to record all this, clearly I would make a completely useless scientist). Anyway, I pushed the driver door lock handle to lock the car but couldn't, when I tried it there was a high pitched alarm and it wouldn't lock. I then tried locking it using the button on my key and nothing happened (i.e. it remained unlocked).

So I then left the car unlocked inside the locked garage and went inside. I returned to it 20 minutes later (without the key) and found the car still unlocked but with everything inside off, so no flashing lights, music or any other signs of power. The iPod was off. I guess it is possible that the battery continued to draw power off the iPod in this state (even though the iPod appeared to be off) but I wasn't going to leave the car for several hours in this state to find that out as it would have meant (possibly) draining the battery again for the second time in a week, but more likely sitting and looking at my GS on a Sunday for no good reason when I could have been driving it somewhere. I guess the best thing at this stage would have been to connect a meter to the battery and measure how much it was drawing -- but owning such a reliable car of course I no longer own such devices

faifai83

What was the water level in the battery when it failed?

jbHI96734

Just traded in my 'beautiful' fully loaded 2013 GS350 after needing to change the battery for the forth time in less than 2 years! Lexus Hawaii could not figure out what was the problem. They wanted me to try the 4th battery before they would consider my car a "lemon". I did not want to wait for another dead battery. Such a disappointment, as I traded in my 2006 GS300 for the 2013 GS350. Last month, got a 2014 RX350. Its an OK car, nothing like the GS. So far, so good, battery still working. (GS depreciated a lot in the 2 years: with 24k miles, it costed me about a dollar for each mile that I drove the car.)

bigblack06

iTrader: (20)

I'm curious how many miles members have when the battery dies. I went though this same problem and after 5k-7k it stopped occurring. In other words the dealer could not replicate it and neither could I. I've left the car weeks and it now starts right back up. I don't as well as the dealer have any clue as to what the problem was.

SNiiP3R

iTrader: (3)

Do they ship cars without batteries from Japan? I'm just thinking, if it takes days if not weeks for the container to arrive from Japan, then by the time it arrives, the battery should already be dead. Its either dealers are not complaining to Lexus or Lexus knows about the pronlem and does nothing to fix it.