2004 LS430 UL Flint Mica with black interior

We bought this car for my wife three years ago with 45,000 miles on it. It now has 75,000 miles.

While all the bells and whistles of the UL edition are fancy, they have turned out to be a maintenance nightmare. The car runs wonderfully, but here is a list of items that need attention:

radar cruise... had Lexus troubleshoot and sensor is bad... $1500 to fix. We turn off the radar and use the regular cruise. Problem is that you have to remember to turn off the radar before you start driving otherwise you get an error when you try to use the cruise.

Telescoping steering... no longer works. either motor or entire column needs to be changed. What's that? Another $1,000? We just ignore it.

Auto trunk release. No longer works. The module is bad and it randomly cycles. I haven't figured out what is responsible or how much this will cost. The wife is tired of this one...need to fix.

Auto mirrors.... something goofy on the driver's side. They auto retract fine, but we can't leave them open or they lose position. Very strange. We just leave it on auto retract and it's okay.

So, what's the total? $4,000 to get everything fixed?

Haven't had issues with the air suspension.....yet....fingers crossed.

Then a few months ago my wife got hit in the grocery store parking lot. $5k damage. Everything looked fine...until summer came and I can see the paint difference in the bright sunshine....


Is it worth it? Kind of makes me miss the Camry......

But can I sell this car without fixing all of this stuff? Maybe trade in?

Suggestions? I guess I have to figure the trunk out first...

 

Wow... many annoyance issues. The steering wheel I would leave as is. As long as it can be adjusted, then that's good. Who cares if it retracts or not, as long as you can leave the car. As for mirrors, if they are not folding correctly, then just leave non-folding and fold only when you need them to fold.

Cruise and auto-release are very annoying things, those items that I probably would get fixed.

 

clean it up and take it to a dealer in the evening or the time of the day that the paint looks its best and trade it in.you may have to take it to more then one dealer to get the best deal,thats what i would do.toyota has zero percent now on camry.good luck.

 

All depends. For me Im a little handy with a wrench and most of those issues I could probably fix. Only cost would be the parts. Of the issues you have the only part I would probably need from the dealer is the cruise control sensor. Otherwise ebay or searching the internet would be your best bet.

 

Some of the broken items like trunk release, mirrors, and the steering column are standard on even the base level LS. These are complex cars at any option level and as they age things do break and repairs are can be pretty expensive on a Lexus.

You may want to actually trade it in on a new Camry (redesigned in 2013) but maybe get an LE model with some but not too many many gizmos to break.

To get most from your trade, shop for and buy the car over the phone, then bring in the LS to pay for and take delivery of the new car and do the trade late on a rainy day or at night....if the dealer is not very smart they will give you an offer on the trade right away..take the offer and run. But be sure to run it buy Carmax first to see what they will give you for it - Carmax will make you an offer in 15 min for any late model used car and usually offer you straight wholesale so at least you will have an offer in hand.

 

Here is what I have done when I needed many various parts in the past.

Search ebay for people selling parts other than what you are looking for but have a photo of the whole car in their listing. (This means they still have the rest of the car but have not thought to list the individual parts you need). Try to get a phone number if you can out of the listing and call/e-mail with your needs list and offer a package deal for everything you want. Seems to me that $1000 would "talk" for everything you need and try to get it all in one swoop from one person. I know if you put the time into this you will get results. I have done this a few times before. Often times they will work with you "ESPECIALLY" if they had not thought to market those particular parts. They WILL take a nice package deal as opposed to waiting to sell them individually to a bunch of other people or not selling them at all and crushing the car. Be preparred to identify the locations of what you need like that trunk module as they may not even know where it is specifically if it is an obscure part. BTW, often as in my example they encourage special specific requests. As in the trunk module and radar cruise, not many people will want these parts and they have a small window to sell them to someone like you. Also, these cars are getting old and the kind of parts YOU need are not in TOO much demand any longer (I would not htink) and that's even more reason to work with you on a package deal.

Here is one example:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/2001-2006-LE...cb2ee3&vxp=mtr

Best wishes, Stephen

 

If you replace the steering column retracting motor, it can be electronically disabled in the customized settings by the dealer. I had this done on both of my lexus', knowing that allowing the steering wheel to retracting/extend every day leads to wear on the motor. It still will work when you use the memory seats, even with the retracting/extension disabled.

For the mirrors, you should disable the auto-retract by keeping the lever in the center. I think some people have repaired their own mirrors (gears inside).

For the radar, I don't know about '04, but '05 I think was the first year for the PCS, and there is a bug in the ECU, causing it to throw an error after a couple hundred miles of driving. You won't even be able to disable the radar cruise by pushing the lever forward and holding it. Price was like $880 to replace, but covered under the CPO warranty.