GasBuggy

Hi, first post on this excellent forum. (If you don't have time to read the long version skip to paragraph 4.) I acquired a 1 owner 94 LS400 from a elderly friend recently and I have getting acquainted with all the bugs. Well worth it though because this is the best riding highway car I've ever driven. It puts my CTS-V to shame as far as ride quality.

Anyway, I bought all the capacitors necessary from Digikey to fix my dark/fickering dash and non working gas gauge. As well as rebuild the ECU to fix a string of other weird problems it has. ( transmission skips 2nd gear, can't apply more than about 1/3 throttle or it cuts out, no downshifting from throttle input, TRAC light lit all the time.) Then occasionally it will run 100% for a brief amount of time.

I'm very competent with car repair and soldering. Tonight I replaced the 3 caps in the dash with the exact cube style used OEM. Not easy to work with but I got them in place without any mishaps. I also replaced the one 47uf capacitor on the ECU (I don't know what this controls). That was a bit tough, that double board is not easy to melt the old solder on.

I put the dash back together with the three new capacitors and plugged the ECU in to test it out. My dash lit immediately and the fuel gauge went much higher than the usual empty. BUT my temp gauge was now pointing much much lower, down by digital outside temperature. I'm not sure what could cause it to go so far down. Any thoughts?

anesthesia

Saved yourself the headache and send your dash cluster to Tanin auto I think he charge $120 super fast service, taking that dash in and out is not fun.

GasBuggy

I gave the top of the dash a good smack and the gauge jumped back up to where it should be. I'm thinking it may just be a sticking and need cleaned up on the backside. I ordered silver conductive grease so I can redo the florescent gauges, so I will have it back out soon. I don't think that removal is that bad. With the first time out of the way I can pull it out in about 15 minutes.

$120 is a good price, what exactly does he replace? I noticed a bunch more capacitors on the cluster boards that I don't think anyone has started talking about yet. They are the same inevitable failure caps used on the ECU.

I need to find a wiring schematic for my car so I can understand it better. Anyone have a file I can access?

I also finished up all the caps in the ECU this afternoon and the car is running great now. TRAC light is still lit though.

RA40

iTrader: (6)

There is a temp sensor that may be due for replacement. This thread is about the ECT sensor. The other coolant sensor is just behind it and has the gray connector. Since you have this accessible may as well do them both.

https://www.clublexus.com/forums/ls-...ange-pics.html

GasBuggy

Thanks RA40, I just ordered it from Toyota on Amazon for $34. But I'm not having much luck figuring out what that other temp sensor part number is.