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CL or UL LS430 has a door that's at least that nice, if not nicer.
Is your LS430 a base or CL or up? Because those interiors are so nice they seem almost hand built.
There is lots of wood in the Phaeton which I like a lot but it doesn't look as good as LS430 wood.
I have a CL yes, it's nowhere close. The "plastic" you see on these are all coated in soft touch unlike the hard plastic controls on a 430.
Again, the wood is 2x thicker at minimum and fully bookmached. It's FAR nicer than any of my 430s or any I have seen, Lexus never once bookmatched anything
Like this is fine, but door handle bezel is plastic. Speakers are not as high on the door, there is no side defrost, way less wood, compromised ashtray location and function, and doesn't have a powered light on the end that is fully dressed up as well as a far inferior grab handle with no metal garnish Just look at the sun shade area, there is a chrome metal strip bordering the glass on both sides and the shade is click retained/hidden when down. Seat controls on a phaeton are all in the center stack where they fall to hand, also each passenger gets their own 3 position arm rest and controls
Last edited by Striker223; May 8, 2025 at 03:19 PM.
I like the red light on the door of the Phaeton a lot. Reminds me of an old Cadillac or otherwise fancy old American car.
And like I said, they were around here when newer. IDK if it's bc it's a conservative area, but nobody seemed to mind the VW badge. Car people know it was massively over engineered.
The CL and UL LS430s even had leather behind the door handle of the glovebox for Pete's sake.
One of the best Alcantara headliners I've ever seen.
Check out how they blended the wood into the dash color on the high end models:
The speaker mesh also looks more high quality than in the Phaeton's, though it's nice there as well.
Okay, I'll try this again.....W12 Phaetons are full book matched wood interiors. Lexus has NEVER done that on anything they have ever made. Even the grab handles have continuing grain from the upper door trim inserts man lol!
Only behind the govebox door latch? There are far more areas a phaeton has leather like UNDER the seats and on the sides of the seat sills. The INSIDE of the glovebox and rear hatches on a phaeton are leather and they have heated wheels etc....the pillar seatbelt adjusters are coated in soft touch vs hard plastic, so is the whole overhead consoles and even the sunroof vent slats. All of it is soft touch coated lol!
Headliner in the euro versions of this car are all full leather btw, I'm working on importing one once the whole trade situation calms down.
Speaker meshes are a weak point sure, but I take solace in the fact that the phaeton was awarded as having the best car stereo system I the world at release.
I like the red light on the door of the Phaeton a lot. Reminds me of an old Cadillac or otherwise fancy old American car.
And like I said, they were around here when newer. IDK if it's bc it's a conservative area, but nobody seemed to mind the VW badge. Car people know it was massively over engineered.
It's stupidly so lol!
The worst part is the badge because thing is a Bentley in all ways other than that. Hell even replacing the batteries is a chore since you need to follow procedure or risk the explosive disconnects getting triggered.
I also forgot to mention it has ANC and road nosie compensation tech, primitive but it does work for certain road noises. Issue is that it's so damn quiet to begin with you need a very loud road to even test it
EDIT: forgot to add that you can also option Toyota Century style of paint, mine has this.
7 paint layers, 7 clear layers, all sanded between layers. Also makes corrective polishing stupid easy and you can bring it back to literal perfection
Last edited by Striker223; May 9, 2025 at 07:36 PM.
The worst part is the badge because thing is a Bentley in all ways other than that. Hell even replacing the batteries is a chore since you need to follow procedure or risk the explosive disconnects getting triggered.
I also forgot to mention it has ANC and road nosie compensation tech, primitive but it does work for certain road noises. Issue is that it's so damn quiet to begin with you need a very loud road to even test it
I’ve only ever seen one Phaeton here. They didn’t gain traction with the Newport crowd because of the badge. Lame if you ask me. It’s a very nice and perhaps overbuilt car.
Yes, the Phaeton is a car I've barely driven since the rear seat is the best I have in the fleet lol! I'm trying to convince my friend to drive the car for the next Arkansas and Florida trips.....
Still using stock rotors. May be time for an upgrade.
🪨📈✂️ for the backseat 🤣
Originally Posted by bitkahuna
changing subjects, saw a very special car this evening... took pic for striker in particular.
fully restored v12 e-type.
spoke to the owner briefly. he'd had that car over 20 years but did the full rebuild/restore over the last 7 years.
the phaeton trunk hinges are a work of art! are there any cases so far of that latch retracting but then not coming back out again? i don't know of any other cars that do that
