RX3002001

Things went semi-well. Transmission fluid now looks great. The owner said it drove the same.

I received a call from the service adviser. He said the Tech said the throttle body was full of carbon and the power steering fluid was filthy. Before taking it to be serviced I did check the PS fluid and it looked much darker than I thought it should look, so I said go ahead and flush it.

Regarding the throttle body, 10,000 miles ago I checked it and it was very clean. No sign of carbon. I was shocked. I doubt the Tech even saw the throttle body. If he only knew what I knew .

The other thing is once the owner drove home I noticed the antenna was up and leaning in toward body of SUV. The SUV was very clean, so I am thinking it was damaged in the car wash. They will have to fix it next week.

Overall a good experience. Lexus wanted double the price for similar repairs. She was basically going to do whatever the Lexus dealership recommended.

LA4Mead

Question: Did the "original design" transmissions that were put in at the factory in the earlier models all have aluminum planetary gears, but then the "updated" new factory replacements (not rebuilds, perhaps to satisfy warantee claims or later models) come from the factory with steel planetary gearsets? Is that what one of the differences were?

My early '99 2WD (May '98) had trouble from the get-go. It contaminated and burned the fluid right away, which I pointed out to the service advisor and Lexus rep and paid for 3 transmission services (none were factory rec even in the manual), before the Lexus offered to replace the transmission just before the warantee expired in 2004, nearly 90,000 miles ago.

When all was said and done, Lexus ended up ordering a brand-new transmission from Kyushu after two rebuilt units had problems. The factory new transmission was supposed to have all compatible but revised software and updated components, but they didn't tell me what the updates were. But it doesn't beat the fluid like the original, and I don't get any grey suspension in the fluid at all, nothing on magnets and a clean paper filter element each time, and all even tho I do occasionally tow a light trailer in very hot weather. I did add a redundant cooler and fan in-line with the factory "tow package" cooler in the fender as cheap insurance to help avoid revisiting the issue.

I think this tranny is much more durable than the trannys they put in originally, but just wondering if anyone knows what the differences were.

code58

I'm not sure just when Lexus went to the steel housing with, I believe, 5 planetary gears. One thing you must remember, when a car company messes up on something big, you'll notice that they often don't rush right into making the fix, even though they know they have a problem and may figure out early on how to fix it. They admit guilt by coming out early with the fix and then are sued and pressured into a recall which then means 100% of the people get it free and in the case of a trans. or engine can cost them SERIOUS money. Far better financially for them to go case by case and lie, deny, stall, flim-flam, etc., etc. to keep it from becoming a true recall. I believe the drive unit is at least fairly similar to the Toyota's that use the 3.0L V-6 and I don't think they had a problem in the sedans and maybe not even the 2WD's, mostly the AWD's. The added weight (SUV) and stress of the AWD seems to be the culprit. I do believe the Aluminum and 4 gears was only part of the problem because though my DIL's RX gets nasty looking, it's mostly just dirty looking, the pan is the only place you really see the "aluminum sludge", so it may be band and clutch wear from the additional weight.