hypervish

Welcome to Club Lexus!!

Keep on !

Boltzmann

I'm glad to hear that I'm not the only one who prefers the shape of the first generation RX's. I love the RX300. Great style. Looks more "masculine" to me than the 330 or 350.

The only thing I prefer about the 2nd and 3rd gen RX's is the black (versus mirrored green) window tint and the monochromatic paint job (an easy enough fix for the 300, if you care to spend the money to do it).

jbl-1985

I can't agree more. I love my 330, but there's something timeless about the style of a 300 that, in my opinion, just has no equal. I look forward to driving it for years to come - doubtful that I'll ever get to 200k miles but that's not necessarily important to me.

dcp7228

Just bought mine two months ago from a family member who upgraded to an '08 350. It had nearly 199k, original engine and trans, and if you didn't look at the odometer you'd never guess it has so many miles. It was maintained by a very responsible aunt who took care of the mechanical parts VERY well, but I'm not sure if she ever once cleaned the thing in 12 years of ownership. After about $100 worth of cleaning products and about 6 hours of work over a weekend detailing the hell out of the entire car, it looks almost as good as the day it rolled off the lot! I had to do the DIY door lock actuator fix, but that wasn't too bad other than getting the bars back into place. When I bought the car I called my friend (who is also my mechanic) to come take a look. He told me that he thinks this model is one of the best SUVs ever made () and that he doesn't doubt me being able to get it to 300k with just routine maintenance.

Dedotom

I have a 2000 RX 300 with 296,000 miles. Original engine. Recently replaced the timing belt at 293,000. The old one looked like it could go for another 50k easily. I have a rattle coming from the rear of the car. Sound like it was coming from the spare tire area. I removed everything from the back, including the tire, and the rattle was still there. Any. Thoughts? Could it be rear suspension problems?
Dedotom

hypervish

Have the struts or strut mounts ever been replaced?

BTW, please start a new thread on this if you can't find the answer by doing a search.

bergi85

I have a 2000 RX 300 AWD that just rolled over 230K miles, bought it back in '07 with 140k on it. Replaced the knock sensors about 3 months back, ignition coils here and there, and tires. Other than that, just basic maintenance oil changes, ect. Love my car!

Bax

New member here. Just purchased a '99 with 310,000. I'm the third owner. The car has receipts for repairs and maintenance from 125,000. Original engine and trans.The receipts shows timing belt changes and transmission service at factory intervals.
Here's the short story on how I bought it.
It was taken to the dealership for a CEL(it was running) and they advised it needed a new engine because of blow by from the PVC valve, not a compression test. It was towed and parked in their driveway for 9 mouths. They decided not to repair it and now I have it. CEL P0305 = #5 ignition coil and I have one on the way. I put a new battery and fresh gas AND IT RUNS. I'm going to start a new thread in a few days on some other stuff. I think I broke the search button on here a few times
bax

Cooldaddy

Well check engine light came on flashing told needs a tune up and also will be doing a water pump n timing belt bought from my neighbor at78k been awesome

UofODucks

I just bought this from a friend. However, his sister bought it new in 2000. Have all service records, It does have a rebuilt transmission. Turns out the original trans was good. The reason I got it cheap was they were told it needed yet another transmission. Although, after 5 min on google and 30 min searching these threads, I'm rolling smooth no issues. I will address the remedy on the helpful thread.

salimshah

I have no idea what 'tune up' means or what it entails. Must be an old old term.

Salim

hypervish

Welcome to the Club!

Raoul

2002 AWD hit 200,000 miles last weekend.

Second owner.
Purchased in 2007 w/120,000 miles.

Lexusblack

very interesting topic. let see how long it goes.

MellonC00

I actually have the monochromic paint that you are referring to. All Silversport came with just, well, silver! All over the body. In fact, I don't have wood trim! Inside the car, I have brushed aluminum (note: not chrome looking silvery stuff) whereever the wood is in the regular RX.

Let me also give you another reason why I'm keeping my car. I now have 207K miles with no engine issues. Sure, I've had my share of small problems here and there, (1. air mix servo, 2. door lock actuators, 3. "D" light out, 4. VVT Solinoid, 5. radio antenna, 6. stock brake rotors replaced with better rotors, 7. and other odds and ends) but the repair cost so far has been quite manageable in comparison to other cars.

The real reason why I'm deciding to keep this car, however, isn't the famous Lexus reliability. It is because I find that the newer Lexus has parts that isn't as good (for the same price). Take for example the electrochromatic mirrors on the IS and ES350 (on the new models). I drove both and they are inferior to the ones that are on my car. They don't darken as much. There is more glare coming from headlights behind you. Then, there is the new 6, 7 or 8 speed transmission. Just the other day I found myself in the top gear of an ES going only about 40 mph at just 1700 RPM. Going through a mild curve I gave it some gas as the traffic cleared up and it downshifted 2 notches and pull the car forward in a huge jerk only to torque steer the car left and right until I let off the gas which upshifted the car back to the top gear just as I passed the apex of the turn. This wonderful herky jerky motion must be funny and amusing to passerby's looking at the deranged car movements but it sure is stupid to drivers wanting to spend more time at the meaty part of the torque band of the car. Wait. I just figured out that the torque has nothing to do with the mission of the EPA and the pursuit of the MPG. It was the MPG peak they were after. That's sort of strange too because at the higher RPM, say around 2200 RPM, it won't necessitate a downshift and probably save gas. Oh, and let me add this. the manumatic shifting isn't all that great either. There is a delay, even, on the IS. It's not huge but there is a delay. The Audi DSG, I think, is much better.

And I don't like the low profile tires on the newer RXs. I don't mind that that they let me feel small bumps here and there but it's the noise that bothers me. Most of the time, your tires are not 100% balanced. As such, there is just an infetestimally small wobble when your wheel turns. With higher profile tires, this is no big deal and you don't hear it. With low profiles, this out-of-balance thing presents itself as noise as low frequencies at low speeds then, higher pitched as you go up the mph scale. it's worse on Lexus because there is no other noise due to heavy sound proofing. It's like listening to changing white noise.

Lastly, up until the 2013 navigation system change, all Lexus Nav sucked. a simple Garmin was better. The lexus NAV has no action verbs. It's say, "Next Right." Instead of saying, "Turn Right on Mainline Street in 0.1 Miles." I think the lawyers did that. And they speak so slow that by the time it finished the instruction (without any action verb) I already passed the turn. I didn't test out the 2013 NAV systems. So things may have improved.

I'm still keeping my car.