dseag2

Best post yet. Yeah, so maybe the BMW fanboys won't be scared and won't be jumping ship for the RC-F, but unless one is trying to decide whether to go for the M4 or RC-F who cares? It is still mighty fast and fun and most people will not be driving them at the track. If Lexus sacrificed some speed (and added weight) for comfort and all the latest gadgets and kept the price competitive that will probably attract buyers. Hell, they could have taken out the back seat to lower weight like MB did with their Black series and created a better track car but who would have bought it? I fail to see why anyone with any other Lexus model (aside from an IS-F) wouldn't want to move up to this car.

Lexura1414

iTrader: (6)

Exactly. Lexus WILL NOT be reading a Lexus fan boy's posting. They know the strengths of the RC-F. They will be reading and ACTING on the criticism's of the car. That is where Toyota's Kaizen philosophy will start/ apply. FYI, Kaizen means "continuous improvement".

SW17LS

If you aren't arguing that the RC-F is a successor to the IS-F, then why are we continually comparing it to the Is-F? Why are you telling us to buy the RC-F and "see how we feel when after 5 years the replacement is only marginally better?" As in...you're upset because the "replacement" to your IS-F isn't what you'd hoped? Can you see how that logic doesn't add up?

My point is there will ALWAYS be lukewarm reviews because it's a Lexus. There are lukewarm reviews of the 4GS and the 3IS and then alongside those they win comparisons. I've been watching old TopGears, in one episode Clarkson talks about how stupid the LFA is. In another episode it's the best car he's ever driven.

Give it the benefit of the doubt and don't write it off after a couple of reviews is my point. Remember...there are very positive reviews from that press day too.

05RollaXRS

As the story goes, Clarkson hated the LFA the moment he heard about it as his hatred for the Lexus and Toyota brand is very well known. He forced Top Gear to hand over the duty to test the LFA over to Hammond. Top Gear nonetheless put LFA in the top 5 greatest cars of 2010 despite his resentment.

Fast forward 2 years, close towards the end of the LFA production, something changed Clarkson's mind and he decided to test the LFA for a feature in the Sunday times and he went from being the biggest hater to the most passionate endorser of the LFA. In the "US Trip" episode, he picked the LFA and declared it the best car he has ever driven.

Even lately, he made such statements that he carries a picture of LFA in his wallet and in the F12 review, he said he would much rather have a less powerful LFA over the F12 because of superior driving dynamics. Whether he means it or not, it is a great endorsement for the brand since he has such a huge following.

Anyway, it is the classic example of how LFA consistently used to turn haters into biggest admirers on a dime.

SW17LS

My point is...drive the car and decide for yourself. If that viewpoint makes me "a whack job" then so be it.

ISFPOWER

iTrader: (20)

+1 . he is a big hater of lexus...was the biggest compliment when he said it was the best car he drove

RNM GS3

People are comparing it to the IS-F bec thats the only other F car Lexus had (LFA not withstanding), bec they share engine components, bec the RC-F is partly based on current IS.

This is nothing new....ppl always compare new gen vs past gen.
There is no doubt the new RC-F is a better car in every way than the IS-F but it seems it doesnt have its raw feel which can be good or bad depending on your preference.

lobuxracer

iTrader: (2)

Just to set a couple of things straight:

Who else in this thread has an annual subscription to TIS and has had one for the last 7 years?

Who else in this thread has bought eight Scion, Toyota, and Lexus cars brand new off the lot (Scion tC and IS350 without even a test drive)? Add another 5 vehicles for used.

Who else currently has a Scion, Toyota, and a Lexus in his/her garage, right now?

Let's not talk about brand support. Let's talk about the ever creeping enemy so familiar to Toyota - weight. Toyota is never lightest in class. The last true exercise in lightweight was the Mk1 MR2. I personally passed a message to someone who talked to Yaguchi. I said "Make it under 3500 lbs and make the alignment fully adjustable like the Supra." I got neither, and they were the only things I truly passionately cared about.

For all the foolish statements about "go buy an M4" please, don't waste your breath. I'd buy a Corvette and blow away the M4 on the street and at the track. There is only one reason I can see for buying a Lexus - the perception of reliability. Why do I say perception? Because nearly every 2UR engine had a failed coolant pump replaced under warranty. I had a Lexus service adviser tell me the leak "might be acceptable, and Lexus won't warranty it." That's not what anyone with a clue says about a coolant leak. Zero leakage is the only acceptable answer. Now owners are finding the engine makes a completely random ticking noise at idle under various conditions. No one at Lexus has been able to tell me, "Yeah, it's just a weird noise, but it won't be an issue" or "Bring that thing in right now, we've got a fix for it." Another owner had the same issue, and Lexus kept his IS-F for two weeks before replacing the serpentine belt tensioner and making the noise go away (as I told him it would based on my car). Bad news is, the noise comes back in 6 months. AMHIK.

Did the bolster on the driver's seat burn through and hole in less than 100k miles? Sure did. Did that happen on my Supra? No, it sure didn't.

Are these fuel pump failures? Turbo failures? DCT failures? No. Are they real and being swept under the rug? Yup!

So while I have not been stranded by my IS-F, I surely have had my issues with the car and they are quality related. Please tell me why I should believe there will be no quality issues with the RCF. I'm all ears.

ilv1004s

iTrader: (8)

alrighty i kinda figured that some one might come back on that
ill take the RS5 out of the equation
but talking about the C63
Does that make sense now?

it seems you guys are very defensive about the RCF
there are good things about it
and there are bad things about it
weight is one the bad things
just have a look at this video

ilv1004s

iTrader: (8)

you got it right there
the only reason why im still looking at this thread and looking for new articles on the RCF
is the ISF suprised me when i bought mine 4 years ago
atleast back then on paper the power was equal but heavier but still manges to smack M3's in the straight but around the track was a different story
im still waiting for my dealer to call me and drop the car off to me for a day of test drive
they really want me to

some might think im hating on the RCF and lexus

i love the brand
i love the F brand
but when your expectations are high the disappointment is also greater
i really expected alot of improvement on the RCF over the ISF

i didnt want to make long essays and start a internet argument but here it is

1. RCF is around 200kgs heavier than the ISF (extra gear etc etc more)

why? it has less doors its similar in size it has less panels
people may argue the TVD etc blah blah blah
but that doesnt come up to 200kgs at all

2. Carbon package

Great we get carbon package
But what does it do ?
it saves 15kgs and you get no moon roof
taking out the moonroof or sunroof will be more than 15kgs so wheres the extra weight coming from? TVD? so the carbon package is there to keep the weight down from the extra weight from the TVD?

3. power to weight
1hp = 4.05 kgs (based on the lightest 1685kg weight) ISF
1hp = 3.86 kgs (based on released figures) RCF

its a meer 200g difference per 1hp
u need to be atleast 1kg differnence per hp to feel any difference

ill just stop here
i can go on, but im going to do a full review once i get my hands on the first car that arrives in my dealer
im just expressing my views on how the RCF should have been much better rather than be a marginally better than the ISF that it carries over from

i think its normal for a loyal lexus enthusiast to feel this way after reading the specs

vbb

iTrader: (3)

In my opinion, Toyota isn't doing a great job of appealing to the people in the market for a performance luxury car, and seems to only capture the brand loyalists and a few others. The ISF has been in production for 7 years and there are tons of car enthusiasts out there at the shows and cars and coffees that still have no idea what the car is. Pull up in one of the German cars or a CTSV and people know what it is. By producing a car with these numbers and this weight, I can't see Lexus pulling in a lot of new to the brand buyers. Those of us that are already brand loyalists that own ISFs are looking at the RCF and are skeptical that it is really going to to be worth the upgrade. Will it be better than the ISF, sure. But worth the upgrade from one? I don't know.

ISF001

VBB,

You know the ISF as good if not better than most of us. For what it is, it's a great car and was a bargain for the money.

The RCF is going to surpass the ISF with handling, low-end speed, looks IMO, etc. I do not believe Lexus was looking to "replace" the ISF with this new car. I believe they are targeting the overall driving experience for a new group of buyers. Clearly, the price point alone--$83-85 for the full ride--is substantially more than we paid for our ISFs.

Is it worth the upgrade? For me--absolutely. It's what I am looking for--new technology, awesome design, a little more on the low-end speed, superior cornering, and better handling (a stock for stock comparison). With a goal of producing only 2,500 per year, Lexus is not looking to conquer the market but to get the F brand on the streets to drive down stream sales.

Everyone may not agree with this strategy, but I believe this is Lexus' goal.

One of the threads questioned reliability: is the Lexus perfect--no. But it is SUPERIOR in reliability when compared to ANY German brand. Find the right dealership, and you will always be pleased with the service results.

I had the first order in on the East coast, and I am sure that the decision to buy will be a great one.

ISF001

DCT Problems and BMW M4

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This might make you feel much better...

"The double clutch transmissions that have plagued the older E9X generation M3 seem to have carried over with a few DCT failures on cars like this, which has 400 miles. The entire transmission needs to be replaced.

Worst of all, BMW assist left him stranded on the road with a pregnant wife and did nothing about it.

No wonder, in racing they don't touch double clutch transmissions with a 10 foot pole."

http://f80.bimmerpost.com/forums/sho....php?t=1003637



Quote:

Was driving last night on the freeway and all of a sudden on the nav screen it said Drivetrain malfunction... Car went into neutral and I coasted onto the shoulder.

When I tried to put the dct in gear it would switch back to park. So it was stuck in gear.. Pressed the SOS button and the call connected and I listened to music on hold for 1 1/2 hours.. No one ever picked up and I could not disconnect. Finally the call ended on its own and I called bmw road side direct from my cell. Bmw road side played so many games, kept canceling tow trucks after waiting 2 hours and then scheduling a tow etc.. Supervisor didn't care at bmw when I escalated it. My wife and I were stranded from 6:45pm to 2am with no food or water. Bmw couldn't reach anyone who wanted to take responsibility for my car being it is lower to the ground and can risk scraping the bumper when pulling on to a flat bed.

The car needed a low loading tow truck.. Bmw said we are going to have to spend the night.. I called AAA and they had the nicest guy out in 30 min.. He didn't have the right truck either but he works with a local bmw dealer and knew exactly how to Handel it.. Bmw roadside never once helped and never told the towing people what we needed to move the car.

My m4 has only 400 miles on it and it's broken.. It's at the dealer now so god only knows what it will need?

ISF001

Read This about the M4


"The M4 is not a particularly heavy car. Much plastic and carbon fibre is used to keep the weight, and therefore the fuel consumption, down. But it feels, as you potter about, as if it weighs more than a football stadium. You really do have to manhandle the wheel, and when you run over a bump, there’s a sense it is simply being squashed."


The Clarkson review: BMW M4 (2014)

Call up the old gang, Mr T - this paint job needs attention

By Jeremy Clarkson
Published 21st July 2014

IT’S ALWAYS been said that technology and ideas developed in Formula One motor racing improve the cars we drive to work every day. Er, right. I see, so does your Nissan Juke have tyres that lose their ability to grip after 24 miles? Does your Toyota GT86 crash if the rear spoiler falls off? Can your Audi A3 be serviced as you drive it down the A38?

You do, of course, have antilock brakes, rain-sensing wipers, automatic headlights, inertia-reel seatbelts and a starter motor. But none of that lot — nothing that really matters — came from F1. And there’s more. If F1 really were developing technology that eventually filtered down into road cars, then you would expect Renault, Ferrari and Mercedes to be at the forefront of hybrid technology. And they’re not.

The car company that is at the forefront of hybrid technology right now is BMW, which isn’t involved in F1. Its little i3 is intriguing, and, as I mentioned last week, the car I’m most looking forward to driving this year is the i8, which by all accounts is comparable to the Porsche 911. Except that it does 134.5mpg.

My worry — and I mentioned this too — is that BMW, like every other company in the world, has a limited pool of talent. And if the brightest and the best have been drafted into the hybrid projects, we have to assume it’s the B-team that is charged with developing the car you see photographed on this page — the new M4. So does that mean it’s not as good as it could have been?

My initial reaction when the car was delivered was to feel slightly sick. That is because it had been painted in quite the most revolting colour I’ve seen. BMW calls it Austin Yellow, suggesting that it would have suited an Allegro back in the day. And it would. But Baby Diarrhoea is nearer the mark.

It’s hard really to judge a car when it is such a horrible colour. It is like trying to learn to understand the moods of a bald dog. And to make matters worse, the other colours on offer are not much better. Best, I think, to go for black.

There’s another advantage to this. If the car is black, you don’t notice quite so quickly that the stylists simply didn’t know when the time was right to step away from the drawing board. Every detail is garnished with yet more detail, and the end result is fussy. The door mirrors are especially annoying. Possibly the company has done this to make the two-door M4 coupé stand out more from the four-door M3 saloon, but I’m really not sure it was necessary.

Eventually, though, I was able to put the styling and the colour out of my mind and concentrate on the car, which — on paper at least — looks a step back from its predecessor, which was called the M3 coupé. That car had a glorious V8 that screamed and hollered as the revs rose and then howled in an orgy of what sounded like BDSM ecstasy as it neared the red line.

Well, you can forget all that. The new car is fitted with a turbocharged straight six. Turbocharging? In an M car? That’s like putting gravy on an ice cream. However, this and the electric power steering are necessary these days if a car is to meet EU emissions regulations. It’s not the end of the world, because you get even more power than you did from the old V8, and a huge spread of torque. On the downside you lose those top-end shenanigans. And the throttle response is a little more squidgy, a problem that’s made worse by a seven-speed flappy-paddle gearbox that offers no creep. Unlike a standard automatic, the car won’t move until you put your foot on the accelerator. Which makes parking a jerky bloody nightmare.

And while we are on the subject of the gearbox, I was forever being told by bongs and rude messages that I might not turn off the ignition until I had put the gearlever into Park. But as far as I could see, there was no Park. What you have to do to solve the problem is to slam the lever this way and that while swearing.

So, to recap, the colours are awful, the styling is blingtastic, the door mirrors are annoying, the gearbox is flawed, the engine is a step backwards and parking is hard. It sounds, then, as though BMW’s B-team hasn’t been able to overcome the emissions regulations, and as a result the car is not as good as the previous model. Yes, and there’s more.

The M4 is not a particularly heavy car. Much plastic and carbon fibre is used to keep the weight, and therefore the fuel consumption, down. But it feels, as you potter about, as if it weighs more than a football stadium. You really do have to manhandle the wheel, and when you run over a bump, there’s a sense it is simply being squashed.

There are, however, some good points. It’s a very easy car to use: all the command systems are as natural as breathing. It is also fitted with fabulous seats. And I loved being able to select tracks on my iPod from a list shown on the head-up display. Oh, and I nearly forgot: it is truly marvellous to drive.

Yes, the engine is different in character from the old V8, but if you sit in the big meat pie of torque rather than at the summit of the power, you find you get all the oomph you want and total control over what the rear wheels are doing. Millimetric movements of your right foot are translated instantly into shifts in how the car behaves, and you can feel it all through the steering wheel, even though it’s not really connected to the car.

The differential is fantastic, the brakes are wondrous, the antilock system is spot-on and the noise is a big bass-baritone that comes from the engine, not some laptop-activated exhaust valve.

It’s fast too. The figures don’t tell you all the story, because when you put everything in Sport Plus mode and plant your foot into the carpet, the car sets off like a disturbed shark. I honestly haven’t enjoyed driving a vehicle as much as this for months.

There was a time, of course, when the M3 was hijacked by the nation’s squash-playing dealmakers. People in braces who didn’t really know what it was; only that it made them look good. It was an accessory, like Oakley sunglasses.


Today these people are driving fast Audis and, to a certain extent, Mercedes AMGs. Which means the M3 and the M4 can be bought once more by people who simply want a seriously good car.


I just wish BMW’s A-team had been involved in its design, though. Because I feel sure the stylists would have fitted less stupid door mirrors and made certain that some of the colours at least didn’t leave you feeling physically ill.

Clarkson’s verdict ★★★★☆

Not bad for the B-team


BMW M4 specifications

Engine 2979cc, 6 cylinders in line
Power 425bhp @ 5500rpm
Torque 405 lb ft @ 1850rpm
Transmission 7-speed dual-clutch sequential/automatic
Acceleration 0-62mph in 4.1sec
Top speed 155mph
Fuel 34mpg
CO2 194g/km
Road tax band J
Price £59,145 (price correct at time of publication)
Release date On sale now

Levi68

I wonder where most got the expectations from? But definitely not from Lexus. You really thought Lexus would build a "better M4" for less? Of course it would like the RC F to be lighter and faster in straight line and around track then all its competitors, but that is not for what I would be buying it.

I think you are all over reacting. Yes the RC F is heavier then the IS F for technically obvious reasons, in the same time the M4 is also lighter for technical reasons. But the difference is by far exaggerated. C AMG and RS5 will not be that much lighter, also the M4 is not really a feather weight.

While RC F might not be the best among its rivals, it will be the best over-all car, just as the IS-F was. If you want to get ripped, by buying the most cheaply built yet expensively priced M3/M4 ever built, go for it.

Just go over at the other M3/M4 forums,and see what a cheap car the M4 is. I don't understand how you can all believe those biased reviews. They said nothing about how the car drives, just that on paper it is written it weighs 4000 lbs. Why the surprise? Didn't Lexus reveal this weight in the beginning of January? Looks like you all expected some miraculous final figures like 3500 lbs and 500 PS?

You cannot have the best in everything at the lowest price. Well you can, its called LFA, but for the narrow minded person that has no idea how building a car works, from conception to delivery, it will always be overpriced and under delivering.

The same that was with the LFA, so will be with the RC F, while on paper it might not be the best, it will turn out to be the best, just like that, what made BMW successful compared to Mercedes and Audi, and Porsche. Unfortunately BMW lost the way, and fortunately Lexus took it.

For me it stays this way: RC F > C AMG > ATS-V > M4 > RS5

Compared to you guys, I have some other more important problems with the RC F:

1. Why no LED rear blinkers?
2. Why so small navi screen compared to the available surface?
3. Why no full-leather package?
4. Why no better looking and better stanced 20" wheels?
5. Where are TRD options/accessories?

Other then that I love the RC F. Would be so proud to drive one.