Yea, I did put the battery in correctly after the fact so the car starts but no acceleration at all

 

Because our car is soo heavily electronically equipped a lot more then just fuses may have been blown. Some of my speakers were gone too...

 

It seems odd to me that something like this would cause damage. Putting a battery in backward seems like something that, while regrettable, could happen quite frequently. In fact, it seems like exactly the kind of thing a car company would design to protect for. I would have guessed that doing this would have just blown fuses. Why would this go beyond blowing fuses and actually cause such severe damage?

 

check for a 7.5 amp ecu fuse. when that blows it enters fail safe. theres 4 fuse boxes in the car, check all.

 

Ijust left my car at Lexus they said it will be a couple days before diagnosis. Finger crossed!

 

Just got the call from lexus of new orleans.. Its the junction box that needs to be replaced. should cost abotut 500 so thats better than what i expected. also wants to clean the fuel line which im not sure if i will let him do. the cost is 130 for that.

 

This happened to my dad's LS - they had to replace a bunch of fuses (easy) and the ECU itself ($$$).

He went to a local shop instead of Lexus - I think they pulled an ECU from an LS in the junkyard and were able to reprogram it.

 

should be some type of safety mode to prevent this from happening.

 

I do find it perplexing why any auto manufacturer wouldn't install a diode into the negative terminal line.

 

My Mitsu had a fusible link right after the + terminal battery cable leading away from the battery. Never blew one, but could be a life-saver in cases like this!