C&D has an first drive in their October 2006 issue, from Austria.
They liked it a lot, especially:
- technology
- features
- built quality and material quality
- better drive then before but...

However they said it was hard to launch and brakes were not that good, which makes me wonder. They clocked it 6 sec 0-60, which is pretty low. They blamed engine not coming to life until its torque sweet spot which is kind of weird for an V8 engine - I wonder if that was not reading the specs and deciding that maximum torque is way too high hence no guts below. Considering how nice of the torque curve their new V6 engines have, using less advanced VVTi and same dual injection, it would be really weird for LS to not have torque before 3,500 rpm.

They should probably start doing what BMW & MB are doing - " xxx of torque from 2,000 to 5,000 rpm".

It makes me wonder if they actually drove the car, or wrote the preview before and entered few sentences from the drive.

Not only the engine thing - they also mentioned how normal suspension was soo good, there is no real reason for air suspension.

But the fact is that several mags already mentioned how in Austria, all cars were equiped with Air suspension, so they could not really test conventional suspension.

Its just one of those things that bugged me from the start.

 

and yeah, they said it should not have any problems keeping its sales crown....

 

367 ft lbs at 4100 and thats too high of an rpm?

 

Has Lexus publish detail torque information for the new engine anywhere? It'd be nice to do a torque-curve comparison.

According to October MotorTrend (very positive review btw), they mention that Lexus 1st-gear is "almost as low as a BMW 750's for sprightly launches, while eighth gear is within 3 percent as tall as seventh in the Mercedes Benz S550". So even with more gears than the German's, the gear ratio is still not as aggressive and I'm sure the throttle response is slow as usual for a Lexus. This setting makes the LS460 "smooth", it also projects "sluggish" response perceived by the driver.

I wonder when you put the gear in manual sequential shift mode (aka Sports Mode?), does the LS quicken the response time also?

 

well if below that the tq curve is low then it could be a problem, with the 8 speed you don't reach high rpm easy. but i would be surprised since this is a v8, tq should be available early

 

No other review so far has placed that much emphasis on the torque etc, AFAIK, but many have mentioned the positive attributes. Looking forward to seeing how the big picture turns out.

 

i can't wait for the ls460 race cars.

 

exactly... then again, if this was written in "October" C&D, they probably tested the cars 2-3 months ago and who knows if they got pre-production unit or whatnot.

Lexus will publish torque curve once car goes on sale, so I guess we will see it then...

 

This O-60 "mania" for a luxury car amazes me!

I can't believe that there are many who are swayed - at purchase time - by how well the car burns-out! Do we have the times for Rolls and Bentley?

Now, fellas, I'm not saying there's anything wrong with being interested in this. (After all, I have a C6 with a G-meter.) But, it just kinda seems like concern over burn-out time - in a gorgeous Lexus 460 - might be a little misplaced.

When I get mine, the starts will be very "respectful."

Big Jimm
So. Fla.

 

Why do you suppose that these luxury cars keep getting faster and faster?

Don't you suppose that MB, BMW, Audi, and Lexus have done their homework?

They have, and have obviously come to the conclusion than many (most?) luxury car buyers like an occasional jack rabbit burst of speed.

For myself, I love the rush when flooring it and merging onto the freeway.

Occasionally, (somewhat ashamedly), I enjoy a red light race (up to the speed limit) in my luxury car.

Ok, I'm showing some juvenile adolescence here, but it's my toy, I earned the money to pay for it, and I'm gonna enjoy it the way I please.

Frankly, if the Lexus was slow, I'd buy something else, reguardless of the luxury and reliability. It's an important factor to me.

I like the gadgets too. Some even turned out to be more useful than I anticipated, like the automatic door latching, but I enjoy all of them.

Luxury and hotrod in the same car! I LOVE it.

LS600hL for me in February, 2008.

HBH

 

I think a lot of it has to do with bragging rights, as well.

 

hopefully this review was only to attract readers and maybe they didn't really test it but just did a mock.

or maybe it was a preproduction model.

 

for the record, a lot of people are interested in the 0-60 time for the bmw 7 and the mb s

 

Well .. alrighty then ..

Big Jimm
So. Fla.

 

To each their own, IMO. There's something for everyone in these magnificent luxury flagships.