Hey everyone,

Saw an 07 450h for sale today, and I would like to know more about the car itself. Who's driven one? What do you think about it? I currently drive an 06 300 awd. I love it, but if there's an upgrade available, I feel obligated to jump on it.

 

I'd stick with the 300. The Hybrids Nickel Metal Hydrite Batteries will be nearing the end of their lifespan as well as the auxiliary drive motors. All of course, theoretically.

300 is significantly less complicated and still very quick.

 

I own a 2011 gs450h. It has been the best car I have owned by far. My friend has a 06 gs300 and it is no where close to the way the gs450h drives. I am going on a limb and guess that most that tell you to stay away have not experienced the gs450h. It was the first rwd dual stage hybrid like the new lc500h. I say go for it, but have some money put away if the battery fails. I believe this car is extremely undervalued in the used market right now, so what you save will be more than enough to cover you if hybrid battery failure occurs. The "real world" acceleration that this car puts down is hard to beat, I am talking 30-65mph. At one time it was the second quickest lexus that they sold. Go drive one and decide. I know the moment I drove one I knew it would be my next car. I was cross shopping a gs460. I would look for an 08 or newer due to bluetooth music etc.

This car is not anymore complicated than any other car. In fact there is no starter motor or alternator so there are actually less mechanical parts that will fail. It doesn't use much of the brakes since it uses the electric motor to regenerate electricity. To each their own but I am a believer in Toyota/lexus hybrid technology. I mean their wec car uses a hybrid system...that counts for something. Expect mpg to be in the 24mpg -26mpg range.

 

Sorry fella, there is x10 as much complexity on the 450H than the standard GS series. You still have the 3.5V6 and all the mechanical needs with the addition of multiple electric motors, inverters, electric starter motor, hydrite batteries, auxilliary battery, regenerative braking system and on and on. If the batteries do fail it is anywhere from $4k-8k, more than anyone would spend on a non hybrid in it's entirety if you couple it with the other systems and maintenence needs of the 3.5.

The GS450H is stunning to drive and is very quick. However as an investment post 8-10 years old it represents a very risky choice.

 

Personaly I would go after a GS350 or GS460 not that the GS450 is bad, and I havent heard to many bad things about it. But resale wise not that very good, unless you pick it up for a smoking deal then by all means jump on it. Just put into consideration the battery packs and few other parts that will eventually go out on it

 

Have you heard that the inverter, electric motor, braking system, starter motor, etc. are prone to failure? None of those things are very complicated, and Toyota has more experience than just about anybody regarding hybrids. In fact, a gasoline engine is much more complex and has far more potential failure points than an electric system! I agree with you on the hybrid battery thing, but it's a bit unfair to list off all the other parts of the hybrid system as potential failure points when recommending someone not to buy the car. Of course, if they do fail they'll be expensive to replace, but that's true for almost every GS component – for example: new axle shafts are $800 each; new windshield is $1000; new cam shafts are around $600 each – if you go through an itemized list of everything that almost definitely won't need replacement (but there's a very minute chance it will) over the lifetime of the car, nobody would buy any GS

EDIT: To the OP – if you want a 450h, go ahead and get one! Just be aware that the hybrid batteries will definitely need replacement at some point, and they ain't cheap (though I think someone here repaired their battery by just replacing the bad cell). At this point in the car's life, the biggest variable is how the car was maintained by the previous owner, so do try to get a PPI before buying, and try to get service records

 

It's quite clearly double the risk of a standard single motor such as the GS300 or GS350. There is a reason why the GS450H has such terrible resale. I don't see what CV's and windscreens have to do with any sort of point? Anyone buying a vehicle at c. 10 years of age with dual powertrains is in for a rude shock.

 

Okay I'll bite. Can you show me the evidence that clearly demonstrates this alleged double risk? I searched "hybrid failure" on this forum, and nothing came up except for discussions about the battery failing. Not one mention of failure in the inverter, electric motor, starter motor, etc. There was also a post about resale value, and the consensus was that the low resale value is solely due to people being scared of the cost of replacing the hybrid batteries. Now if you do have evidence of other components of the hybrid power train failing at a high rate, please do present it!

Oh and the regenerative braking system doesn't actually have any additional parts, it just uses the electric motors as generators, which recharges the battery and slows the car down

Again, I do agree with you that the cost of replacing the hybrid batteries is a legitimate concern when considering a 10 year old hybrid car. On the other hand, saying that the hybrid system makes the 450h twice as risky as a 350 or 460 is an absolutely invalid statement unless you present evidence to support this assertion

 

Evidence or common bloody sense?! If you want to go out and purchase a vehicle with dual drive systems as opposed to a conventional set up at the c. 10 year of age mark, be my guest.

Obviously the main problem is battery failure, we already covered this. We are now pushing into a new frontier with all these other Hybrid components. We have never really had aged Hybrid cars and common sense suggests a vehicle with twice as many components as the same model readily available without them is a fools choice once the vehicle reaches the decade mark.

I don't really care if you search the entire web. I don't need to justify common reasoning and I did not say these parts "had" failed. It's safe to assume more problems are going to arise simply on the law of averages. Twice as many components = more reliability concerns.

Not to mention other components the Hybrid has like CVT and adaptive damper shocks that the original run of GS300s and GS350s did not have pre facelift. These are hugely expensive to replace once they rake up mileage. I co managed a used prestige dealership for a long time and we had to do numerous shocks on GS450Hs and GS430s. We also did rear auxiliary batteries in most Hybrids and whilst the main battery packs were not throwing up failures they never held more than a half charge and were diminished significantly just with age alone. Not to mention the heat in Australia does not help their longevity.

​​​​i'd happily own a GS450H from brand new until 4-5 years. In fact I'd prefer it to a standard GS. However after that period i'd ditch it quick smart and prefer a conventional set up if I was holding onto the car for 10-15 years of age.

 

I doubt Lexus would build a car even if it's a hybrid and not run without big problems for at least 15 years. My only issue with the 450H is the CVT and no AWD. Otherwise, I'd have bought it myself at that age.

 

Same here.. i much prefer the 6 speed experience over the constant CVT hum.

 

So In other words, the common sense thing to do is to ignore all the evidence that the hybrid drivetrain is reliable (i.e. the absence of reports of failures or other data demonstrating unusually high failure rates) and condemn the 450h as an unreliable future money pit based solely on a preconceived notion?

True, but electric/diesel-electric drivetrains have been common on locomotives and ships since the 50's, and is also common in heavy industry. The technology is very well understood, so there's no reason for common sense to dictate that it will be unreliable in a car.

Yes you absolutely do need to justify common reasoning – at one time, common reasoning held that the sun orbited the earth, which obviously is absolutely wrong. And there aren't twice as many components in a 450h as in a 350. The hybrid bit is just a few batteries, a couple motors, an inverter, an electric coolant pump, an additional computer module or two, and some wiring. The motors each have one moving part, the pump has a couple, the battery assembly has a cooling fan, and the rest are solid state electronics without moving parts. One 2GR cylinder head has over 20 moving parts. Most of the expensive repairs in a drivetrain are for failures of moving parts, so realistically the gasoline engine is the more issue-prone part of the hybrid powertrain.

Also, citing the law of averages is meaningless unless you can actually provide some data about the average failure rates. For example, if the inverter were to have a mean time before failure of 100,000 miles, that would absolutely support your position. A mean time before failure of 500,000 miles would mean that the inverter is far more reliable than most drivers will ever need, since few people will put 500,000 miles on their GS. Without these data we can't know for sure which is the case, but since there are no reports of inverter failures that I've found, I suspect the situation is closer to the latter.

And don't take this the wrong way, I'm not trying to attack you and I'm not trying to convince you to buy a 2007 450h. I just don't want someone who does want a 450h to be scared away because of an argument that relies on supposition and blanket statements, and is devoid of any hard facts or evidence

 

Let's just agree to disagree on this one then. Clearly we don't see eye to eye. I find the law of averages far better reckoning than afformentioned windscreens.