Hi all,

I just bought a 2002 LS 430 with 143,000 miles on the clock and I'm drawing up a maintainance schedule for myself.

From the Lexus service schedules here in the UK it states that the differential oil should be changed every 20,000 miles. That seems rather frequent to my mind. Is this really necessary?

Thanks

Mike

 

Well, let's see: it has 143,000 miles and the diff has never been replaced so I would say YES. It's a small price to pay to maintain a very expensive part.

GT

 

Sorry George, I didn't really make it clear. The car has always been very expensively serviced by a good Lexus dealer (usually $1,500 - $2,000 equivalent a time) and the diff. oil has always been replaced every 20k.

Now I've got it, however, I intend to work on it myself and, as you can imagine, I don't want to change the diff. oil every 20k when it maybe ok to do it every 40k say. (My existing Ford Scorpio has just had it's 313,000 mile service, (I change the engine oil every 3k) and it had never had a diff oil change until now, and no problems).

So, back to my original question - why 20k? Would 40 or 60 or 80k be ok?

Thanks

Mike

 

My bad! I meant that if it has always been changed at 20,000 miles, why not continue this routine since it appears to work. If you extended it to 40,000 mi. intervals then 60,000, at some point some real damage will occur. I would keep the 20,000 interval: it will only cost a few dollars (pounds? euros?) since you will be doing the labor.