rx300s415

Hey guys well recently I hit 100,000 miles on my 2001 RX300 Silversport
Hurts me pretty bad seeing this...as it is my commute car for work...and I go all over the Bay Area and I guess you can say most of these miles are highway miles...Well I do take good maintenance of my car...I change oil about every 4,500 miles (Fully Synthetic....Castrol brand I THINK...my mechanic (also a personal close friend) gives me this oil used in BMW's now...viscosity is 10W-30 I believe (might not be sure...I recently did a lot of oil changes for friends and all these viscosity numbers are flying in my head)...in addition...I flush my coolant...bleed my brakes....roughly about every 8,000-10,000 miles. Recently...I just had a really bad feeling like I just lost a load of power...I feel like i'm driving a 4-banger around (No offense to anyone of course, I have a 4-banger myself)...anybody got a solution for me?

salimshah

Did not see air filter replacement and spark plugs replacement, You very well can be down to 4 chambers working.

Check the drag [coast in neutral on an empty road=.
Check your MPG.
Check drastic loss of tire pressure.
Time to replace your timing belt.

Salim

Lexmex

Salim mentioned some excellent things to check.

I was wondering if you have a check engine light on?

Other thing is that your driving habits over time lead to the RX feeling like you are riding a cow (happens to me every week with my daily commute) and I have to pull the battery cables off for a few seconds to reset this.

Ask you buddy if that stuff is Castrol 0W30 (really good stuff)

tcheung87

I feel that if you're at 100,000 miles there might be enough random buildup to rob you of power, maybe you could try cleaning the Throttle body and minor here and there stuff, replace MAF. Definitely replace the timing belt if you didn't do that at 90k.

-tc

rx300s415

Sorry I did not list (and thanks a lot for the quick response Salim!) But I changed my timing belt and water pump at about 96,000 miles. I changed my air filter over to K&N at about 90,000...and I recently checked on my MAF sensor...it's still very clean....I also changed my spark plugs at about 91,000 miles (I run Bosch Platnium +4s)....my MPG is 14 (This is so painful...gas is at 3.23 a gallon ) And the drag feels fine..nothing is holding it down it seems... I recently got new tires (about 85,000 miles)...

tcheung...Yeah I guess you are right...what else can one expect at 100,000 miles....this is the first car I own that I have taken to this mileage (I have driven friend's cars with over 100k miles though)...

Lexmex...I will try unplugging the battery and all, but I am just wondering...are you saying my ECU has adapted to some type of driving habit? Because I have a '03 Mercedes and you know how Benz's now have that "learning ECU" where it monitors the first 40 accelrations and sometimes other factors...then the ECU adjusts a bunch of things here and there to suit your "driving habit."

Also Lexmex...the stuff I use is Castrol Fully Synthetic 10w30 I believe and I don't have a CEL.

Thanks for all your thoughtful responses guys...

TunedRX300

Another quick check is PCV, replace front and rear differential gear oil with synthetic 75w-90 GL-5.

Check the weight of your replaced tire. Heavy tires robs torque and decrease mpg. Another factor: New tire has larger diameter than a worn out tire. Your Odo/Speedo should be off slightly when tires are replaced. This leads to a slight decrease in mpg reported by the car (not actual).

Only Castrol Syntec 0w-30, made in Germany, is truely synthetic. Castrol Syntec is not techically synthetic as its base oil is highly refined from petrolum crude oil. It is legally OK to market such oil as synthetic in the US but not in Japan and Europe.

Why one cares about lower weight and whether true synthetic is the base oil? It helps your mpg and power in two ways:
1) viscosity is lower at startup with synthetic oil.
2) 10w-30 should have higher viscosity than 0w-30 or 5w-30 by SAE weight classification.

What you can try is increase tire pressure slightly, to buy 0w-30 at Autozone for next oil change, check your brake calipers and make sure they don't stick.

Lexmex

That's right, it does monitor the driving habits. It will reset a few things like your radio controls and clock, but no harm.

LiqrSicc

Hey I feel the same way... except I have a reason for it. I've managed to make my vehicle heavier with bigger rims, bigger tires, and about 150lbs of extra electronics. Not to mention hitting 150k miles on the car. There really isnt much you can do for the car with mileage that high. Maybe you can make it to our meet this weekend in Daly City. Check out our NorCal forums her on CL. Tcheung87 are you going? It'd be nice to have other RX instead of being the only one

rx300s415

Thanks for the invite Ligr but I see that the meet is "booked" so I guess sucks...cause it would have been nice to see other Lexus' and such......oh yeah guys...I just changed my brake pads today...resurfaced my rotors (1st time...brembo rotors)...and rotated tires...and I got a question about 0w-30....I don't know much about viscosity really (When I did oil changes I just stuck with what the cap said since most cars I dealt with weren't too high in mileage)....but would 0w-30 damage my engine since it is a really lightweight oil? Wouldn't my gears not run well with it?

TunedRX300

Read this Thin Oil Myth FAQ
http://theoildrop.server101.com/foru...e=0#Post711581

LiqrSicc

We had a few people cancel out, so you might just wanna post on the thread just to make sure. We can be the slowest cars in the meet together!