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Left my company car at home last night and drove it to work. This was really the first time I got to get out and let her stretch her legs a little bit. I'm simply amazed at how effortlessly she gets up to speed. Cruising at triple digit speed is so uneventful. Exactly what I wanted out of the car... a big, comfortable highway cruiser. The new Falken Pro G4 A/S tires I put on it seem to be doing great, very quiet. I find the overall ride a bit floaty at speed, but that is something to be addressed down the line.
After I got to work, I had to look back as I was walking away...
I was wondering how you liked those tires after mentioning them in the tire thread. I just put a pair of the same tires on my mazda CX5 but of course they have a much taller sidewall on our mini suv and they are on the back so all i can really attest to how nice they ride or anything. I was looking at them for the Lexus next as it will need all new tires soon. I've used various Falken tires in the past with good results
I was wondering how you liked those tires after mentioning them in the tire thread. I just put a pair of the same tires on my mazda CX5 but of course they have a much taller sidewall on our mini suv and they are on the back so all i can really attest to how nice they ride or anything. I was looking at them for the Lexus next as it will need all new tires soon. I've used various Falken tires in the past with good results
They're pretty good... ideal for what I am going to use them for which is highway cruising. I've only got a few hundred miles on them so far, but they are very quiet, even at triple digit speeds. Not sure about wet weather, but my car will never be driven in the rain if I can help it. Initially I didn't want an all season tire, but then I figured that it's a 4,000 pound car and I'm not going to be throwing it around in corners or anything... at least not until I upgrade the suspension, so the Falkens should be fine. The kid at Discount Tire was pushing hard for the Michelins, but so far, for $681 out the door, the Falkens have been great and I would recommend them.
Amazon brought a few things. Still waiting for the crush washers for the rear diff. I know you can reuse the old ones but the new ones were cheap. Also waiting on some white LEXUS vinyl stickers for the calipers. Probably just going to do one caliper at a time...
I was wondering how you liked those tires after mentioning them in the tire thread. I just put a pair of the same tires on my mazda CX5 but of course they have a much taller sidewall on our mini suv and they are on the back so all i can really attest to how nice they ride or anything. I was looking at them for the Lexus next as it will need all new tires soon. I've used various Falken tires in the past with good results
I had them on my Gs300 when I bought it. Definitely ride super quiet and comfortable. But they wear out super quick. Even with 5,000 mile rotations and perfect alignment. the rubber compound is just too soft for cars as heavy as some of the Lexus. Just my .02
Rear diff service completed with Mobil 1 75W90 and new OEM crush washers. Both plugs were on super tight, though I don't think this service has ever been done before. Old fluid was pretty dark, but the magnet was actually pretty clean. Had to jack the car up just a touch to have enough room to easily work. Will do this service again in 60k.
Replaced the locking lug nuts with OEM regular lug nuts. Honestly, no one is out there stealing OEM Lexus wheels and it's a pain in the butt to deal with them when trying to remove the wheel. Haven't done anything else the last few days... waiting for pay day at which time I think I am going to paint the calipers. Trying to decide between black or silver...
I'm always worried about losing my locking bit I keep in the glove box, I should probably do this too. For the wheel calipers do you plan on having any sort of logos on them? Black could look pretty cool if you had white logos to contrast and go with the body color. Or even doing a grey like "nardo grey", I don't know if you can easily find cans that would be this color.
Nardo grey calipers with white letters would be really cool, or even doing the reflective lexus logo for the calipers.
Drove to work last night and thought my headlights seemed dim... turns out, the passenger side wasn't on. Cycled the switch and it came back on, but then did the same thing driving home. Was starting to worry about an expensive repair, but then found that the bulbs go out after while. I guess that explains the slight color difference between the driver's side and the passenger side. Will replace both bulbs next payday.
Did the front calipers today. Garage isn't big enough to get the whole car up on jack stands for the 24 hours that the paint needs to fully cure. Will do the back next week. I ended up going to black because I wanted it to be subtle. Once it finishes curing, then I'll apply the white vinyl decals. The first coat of paint looks terrible, but the instructions say to make it a thin coat. For the second coat, I used a foam brush and that really seemed to do the trick. Here are a few pictures for now, will add a final one once it's all dried.
It's supposed to be self-leveling, so it should be very smooth and glass-like once it's done.
It had good reviews and was cheap. One can could probably do 4-5 cars easily IMO. I used brake cleaner and a wire brush to clean the calipers before hand, but thankfully they weren't that dirty to begin with. As you can see, I didn't take the calipers off... everything that will be visible through the wheel was painted. I don't really care if a small portion on the back of the caliper didn't get painted... no one will ever see it.
Cured faster than I thought it would. It is still so hot here in Houston that I think it helped speed things along. Will still wait till tomorrow before mounting the wheels back up. Pretty happy with the results. Hope it settles a bit more, but from more than a foot away, it looks great. With the wheels on and covering most of it it should be fine.
On the Battery Tender now. What does everyone use for the ground location on their cars? I'm using the strut top bolts for the time being... looked around and really didn't see anything that looked like a solid ground.
10-25-17, 09:08 AM
