Hi everyone, just signed up.
I dont want to just staart asking questions right off the rip, so I would like to introduce myself.
Im Damian, I go by Ngin or if we ride you know me as Snakebyte. I worked for Lexus for a wopping 89 days. I was let go due to me stealing most of the other techs work. A hard lesson for sure, but I learned and used it for the future. I was young then and always ever since that I have had a soft spot for Lexus. They are great cars for sure. Ive seen cars with 1mile and Ive seen cars with 375k miles. Good cars for sure, says a lot about the owners as well. Well as you have it time goes on and I have never owned a Lexus...untill now. I have a 2007 GS450H, it is Silver. I love it! I bought it at auction and the whole side of the car was guard railed, all the rims were scrapped and the interior looked like a huricane broke out inside the vehical. After some TLC and a trip to body shop she looks like new. Ive spent a total of 10k on parts and of course Labor from the body shop. I have a few bugs to work out and they are out of reach from my expertise.
My Mom took one look at the car and she loves it. So much in fact she offered to buy it from me.. So it is sold, im just trying to fix all the little bugs..
Doing searches on line this group always came up, so I decided might at well join and see what I can learn. If I can help others I will, but somthing tells me Im going to learn a lot more from you guys.
So here is what I do, I go to auctions and with a dealer who happens to be my sister in laws buyfriend I/we buy Lexus fix them and sell them. Funny how things work out.. I bought 2 more. A 2006 GS300 AWD, and 2004 ES330.
I do this to make extra money on the side. My Wife of 17 years, recently became Disabbled from a accident, so now Im picking up the pieces and doing what I can.

So thats it in a nutshell. No BS or hype. Im straight forward and like a good challenge. I look forward to conversing and hopfully meeting a few. Im in OHIO, you could say Im stuck in Ohio, lol.

Attached are some photos of when I visited the body shop

 

welcome Ngin. first of all very sorry to hear about your wife's accident.

congrats on picking up and restoring the GS450h - love the 'woosh' of midrange power in them!

i'm moving this to car chat where it might be more appropriate, and keep us updated.

 

Good to know you, and very sorry to hear of your wife's accident.
Did you spray up the rims, or the body shop?
Keep sharing the next stages of this restoration, please.

 

Welcome

My NSX is from Ohio and I recently saw the National, and eat too much Graeter's ice cream , so I support Ohio

 

Welcome to Car Chat, Damian....and Happy Holiday. Glad to have you. Sorry to hear about your wife. Best of luck to her on her recovery....as much as possible. I generally don't recommend buying from auctions, for a variety of reasons (among others, very risky), but I know many people do. As far as your mom buying the car, I know you might not be able to afford to, but, considering all your Mom did in raising and caring for you, she probably deserves to simply have the car as a gift. Interesting shot of the body shop there. As far as as working on the GS Hybrid (or any gas/electric hybrid), be very careful under the hood or around the battery-pack, and follow exact procedures...a lot of inexperienced or careless techs have been injured working on this type of vehicle. If you worked at a Lexus service facility for three months, you may (?) have already learned some of those techniques from either the shop or a factory-approved course.

 

Thank you guys for the input.
The body shop did the rims. They ground them down and filled the pits with a special epoxy, then epoxy primed and base cleared them.

The pic of the car on the frame machine is after I replaced the doors and front fender. I got lucky and found a matching color car at a scrap yard not too far out of state. usually car around here have the brown cancer so finding parts out of state is a must.

The pic of the bumper off is at my garage after leaving the body shop. I had some headlight swivel codes.. Upon inspection I found the left motor was never bolted down and it rubbed through the wires. the left had a odd resistance from the swivel sensor. FYI, DT MOTO headlights are just repackaged Spyder headlights.

 

Congrats and welcome, we have to admire the spirit of trying to do what we can on the side, to keep on chuffing on. I honestly think that's what makes the people of our nation great.

 

Welcome to the forums. I still get compliments on my GS from colleagues and family. Engine and transmission on these cars are rock solid.

 

Welcome to the Club.

 

Thank you all.