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Lexus Benchmarking German Car Body Rigidity
Know your priorities I guess....
https://www.motor1.com/news/731506/l...idity-updates/
Lexus Wants All of Its Cars to 'Taste' the Same Brian Silvestro ~3 minutesAug 27, 2024 at 1:00pm ET
The Japanese Toyota sub-brand has been benchmarking cars from its German rivals since 2018, according to a report published Tuesday by Automotive News. What engineers found was Lexus cars were not able to match the Germans' body rigidity. Development teams across the brand have since set out to add support bracing to the front, rear, and two middle sections of every model in the Lexus lineup, says Auto News, with plans to both improve performance and develop a signature Lexus driving identity. "We are aiming for the same driving taste, no matter what Lexus model you are riding in," Toshinori Ito, project manager for Lexus' sensitivity performance development department, told Auto News. Previously, Lexus had been focusing on adding rigidity only to the rears of its cars, before learning about how its rivals approached body assembl "We didn't fully understand the four body positions," Ito told Auto News. "We learned about it from studying the competition. When we realized it, we wanted to add it to all Lexus models." Improvements have already been introduced into Lexus's manufacturing process. The fully electric RZ got extra front bracing when it started production in 2022, while the NX crossover got updates to the front end in 2023, and improvements to the rear in 2024. The company says this bracing has been trialed on every car in its lineup, including its ES sedan and its LM minivan, not sold in America. "We confirmed it can be done across the entire lineup," Ito told Auto News. Eventually, these changes will be fully implemented across the lineup, but it could take years, as some upgrades require more extensive changes to the chassis, and therefore the manufacturing process, than others. Still, this is all good news if you enjoy driving. |
Probably never will.....the LFA is 1000nm/degree less stiff than my D4s are (45k Nm/*). It makes a major difference in how the car talks to you, I didn't even realize how stiff they were until I read through my commemorative book and it was bragging at Audi managed to make the stiffest 4 door ever.
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So what have the Toyota engineers been benchmarking when they were developing the TNGA? Overcooked ramen? The GH and to a lesser extent the TX, feels like it was made from wet noodles when you close the door.
Adding additional bracing is good and all but you cant make it up for having thinner sheet metal and cheap steel at the back half of the car. As a racer shouldnt "Morizo" be able to feel that the chassis is flexing too much? Between engines blowing up and subpar structures, it hasnt been a good yr for Toyota. |
Originally Posted by situman
(Post 11779252)
So what have the Toyota engineers been benchmarking when they were developing the TNGA? Overcooked ramen? The GH and to a lesser extent the TX, feels like it was made from wet noodles when you close the door.
Adding additional bracing is good and all but you cant make it up for having thinner sheet metal and cheap steel at the back half of the car. As a racer shouldnt "Morizo" be able to feel that the chassis is flexing too much? Between engines blowing up and subpar structures, it hasnt been a good yr for Toyota. Friend of mine works as a manager/head dispatcher for a local pest control company and they just bought 6 new Tacoma and 2 frontiers to replace the older fleet of tacos....currently 3 of the new tacos have dead engines, 2 have bad misfires, 1 is alive but shifting weird and none have 10k miles. Friend has one of the two frontiers as that is what the managers get and there are no issues. I was shocked to hear that even the taco is having problems now. |
After benchmarking the Germans since 2018, the only thing they found was a lack of body rigidity?
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Originally Posted by jwong77
(Post 11779421)
After benchmarking the Germans since 2018, the only thing they found was a lack of body rigidity?
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Originally Posted by jwong77
(Post 11779421)
After benchmarking the Germans since 2018, the only thing they found was a lack of body rigidity?
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Originally Posted by jwong77
(Post 11779421)
After benchmarking the Germans since 2018, the only thing they found was a lack of body rigidity?
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Originally Posted by situman
(Post 11779510)
Well they copied the bad engine metrics and one upped the Germans on that already. Time to move on to having the rest of the car being terrible.
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Originally Posted by Striker223
(Post 11779532)
Funny that the Toyota options are now firmly less reliable than the Germans engine wise....
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Originally Posted by FrankReynoldsCPA
(Post 11779541)
Funny you should say that.....I can think of one Toyota that has a reliable turbo-6. :p
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Lexus should benchmark their new cars against the original LS and then see all the areas they have regressed on over the last 20 years.
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Originally Posted by 703
(Post 11779554)
Lexus should benchmark their new cars against the original LS and then see all the areas they have regressed on over the last 20 years.
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Originally Posted by 703
(Post 11779554)
Lexus should benchmark their new cars against the original LS and then see all the areas they have regressed on over the last 20 years.
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Originally Posted by Motorola
(Post 11779574)
All you need to do is artificially inflate Japan's housing market bubble to the extent that one building is worth more than the entirety of California, and then maybe Lexus will have the funding and incentive to build another LS400. Mazda can buy all of BMW while they're at it.
Instead, Lexus is just a poor cousin of Toyota and gets minimal benefit from the $10b a year R&D - towards relentless pursuit of cutting production costs. |
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