I am the new owner of a 04 430Ultra - 17K Mi and wanted to confirm if the RPM range and operation is normal on cold start. Several things to note, climate control is OFF, not on Auto, outside temp is 50 deg range, and gas is 93 Oct.

Sequence of events - turn key, engine fires, RPM @ 800-900 then briefly climbs to 1400 then drops to 1100-1200. So far I consider this "normal" operation, however enter stage 2, once it drops to 1100-1200 for about 2 sec, it then revs to 1700-1800 then slowly idles down over the next 15-20 seconds.

I have read and researched the forum for related topics and cannot validate if this is correct or something is "out of order" so to speak.

The issue as I see it is two fold, 1) high RPM at startup while OK for lubrication in my estimation will prematurely wear internal compontents especially if it is 0 deg as common in our area in the winter, and 2) engaging the car to back out of a space or garage usually occurs during this "high RPM interval" causing one to move rather quickly in reverse. This of course can lead to a very bad looking rear bumper in short order.

We don't see this on our Tundra 4.7L - of course it only has 10% of the "smarts' of this car but the engines and presume electronic controls are related.

So is this two stage condition normal on cold start on the LS and am I being too ****-ytical ? Thank you in advance for your replies.

Carl

 

Carl, I also have an 04 UL with 29K miles and I always run premium. Shut off the front & rear air before starting car. Outside temp was 51 but car was registering 68 in the garage. Turned the ignition with foot off gas and rpm was reading 1000 then went to 1100 for a second or two then down 1050. Let it idle for a minute then gave it some gas then left off and rpm dropped to 1000 and stayed there. Hope this helps.
You may be having something weird going on. At least you have that warrenty.

 

iSpeed,

Thanks for the feedback and your's seems to work as I would anticipate is appropriate for the car and my experience. This will be added to my list on return to the dealer for resolution. This is one of those things that are hard to replicate unless the car stays overnight at which point its their interpretation of the issue, so I will probably take a short video.

 

my 05 has 22K miles on it,,

on cool or warm days starting the car runs up to 1200 rpm and holds for a good minute and then will slowly head to the 700 rpm for normal idle,, never have seen it go above the 1200 regardless of how cold it is,,

 

Dealer cleaned throttle body and now the car starts and runs as expected - seems the P/O left the car gargaged on Cape Cod so between the salt air and low use (17K Mi) the TB was corroded. Since we are still under 4/50 original warranty did a number of other updates and fixes like lastest Nav DVD Jan 07, replaced wheel due to out of round, replaced rear suspension sensors (sagging intermitently), trunk struts etc. Everything is good - thanks for the feedback.

Carl

 

Carl,
thats great that they fixed it.Should be easier to keep that T/B clean up here in NH away for the salt air.They seemed like they really went over it well to,was that in Manchester or Watertown?
I went down to Manchester last wekend and they had non LS430's on the lot.Sales guy claimed they could not sell them so they sent them off to auction (of course they where trying to get over $40k for 40,000 mile no navs!)

 

Hi Dan,

To make a long story short - driver side window glass got broken by a small rock thrown up hit DS side mirror then ricochet into DS window. Its the laminated glass so I had flight out of MHT mid June so took it to Ira MHT since they are less than a mile to the airport. They said they would replace the glass and also had them "look at" high idle and suspension sag. During review they said "car has evidence of damage" and did not want to do any work as it would be a charged event for them to investigate further - I said HMM since CPO is anywhere, but RED flags went up about the car since it's less than 30 days since delivery..

So prior to calling Lexus of Watertown I had the P/O contact data in the nav system so wrote him a nice note asking about any "damage" and he was very forthcoming - no damage other than someone backed into rear bumper and was repaired - no insurance claim so this resolved that matter. Prior to purchase I checked and all VIN's are on fenders etc. where they are supposed to be so everything was in line with P/O story.

So took car to Lexus of Watertown - gave me a loaner for a week that I was out of town, took care of ALL the issues, filled car with gas, washed it - great service - plus got all service records since new. So Lexus Watertown did a great job fulfilling their committment.

Now back to the original story about IRA Lexus Manchester for side window replacement - parked outside (no inside service there) went in and waited 20 min, no service advisors, was asked 4 times "do you need help" and yes I am waiting to be seen about service plus I had a flight in 90 minutes (planned for 30 min @ dealer) still no service advisor. I had sent service manager a detailed email with all data, re insurance claim details to replace glass prior to arriving and they could not "find" what was sent to service manager who was unavailable. Finally they arrive and service consultant puts data in computer - exactly what I sent them via email then she makes error on input and it doesn't print - so we do it again. All told 40 minutes when it should have been 20 or less, but I made the filght with time to spare.

So in my opinion IRA MHT has a way to go before they are a true Lexus dealer as they are a Toyota dealer trying to be something they are not.

 

Hi Car_NH
and thanks for giving me the rundown of your experiences with both Watertown and IRA MHT Lexus.Mine have been pretty similar (expect I have been unable to Alex M to move on his used LS prices)
My first experience with Ira (befrore they owned the MHT one) was back when I was buying my wifes,new, RX330 and we went back and forth with them and Watertown(the then MHT Lexus was a no haggle one price(high) dealer).Watertown ended up giving us the best deal and the sales guy from Ira last word was a sour grapes "I could have gone a bit lower",
Once they bought the NHT Lexus (and attached TM dealership) we had some good (replaced rad under warranty but no Lexus loaner)some bad (would not replace the faulty rotors under warranty as we took the car to the closer Concord TM dealer for service-not 'legal" but they got away with it)
My wife and I went down there to see about a used LS430 and they had none!We where told they "sent them off to auction as they could not sell them".Nice enough sales man but stange way to do business.
I tried calling them about doing some service (paid out of warranty) and was on hold for so long,twice, that I gave up.Its too bad we have no compitition here in NH I think that would both rasie the bar and lower the price.A after market Lexus specialist would also do quite well.Wish there was one.
thanks for your post,and pleased your LS is working up to speed now.
Dave