Greetings, fellow owners and enthusiasts,

Apologies there is a post that is 6 years old that is related to this post but is in the 3rd gen section.

This is my second full week of ownership and have been walking though the maintenance tasks. Axle inspections, drive belt and air filters are completed.

Not in the scheduled maintenance manual but a task I did want to tackle is the transmission drain and refill. At the elementary level I then began to explore the first part of the process which is lifting the car and realised there are running boards. The premium package which was a pleasant surprise means that the pinch welds are not accessible from my inspection.

In this discussion @Clutchless mentions finding the reinforcement somewhere on the frame. My question is that can I use the crossmember or does that have an angle such that the bottle jack could slip? I tried to sketch this very miserably in this picture below.


Location for the bottle jack

 

i have no problem jacking from the rear but the pain in the front is removing the front bottom cover to just access the front jack point.

 

They don't make it easy.

 

Is this car two weeks old, or did you buy it used?

 

used. I believe new models the boards can move. The cross member is what I thought would be the easiest as in this . Any one had experience with this before?

 

I see the front reinforced point and it’s not covered. Did you remove covers to get clearance for the jack?

 

Yes, but once I learn how I am guessing its would be straight forward but am sure of the spots to place the jack stand bottle jacks.

 

We should not have to be "guessing" and the owners manual is not much help.

 

I agree. The owners manual provides divergent instructions for the jack points. The scissor jack at the pinch weld for tire changes and the reinforced point on the subframe for everything else. I am going to try to find a service manual to get explicit information. The shops have to have other points on the unibody to lift the car.

If not accessible I guess I may to move on to the spark plugs as the next maintenance item!

 

This is where the RX 4th gen. forum will be the most useful. I would like for Lexus mechanics here to step forward and describe exactly where the good lift points are under the body. Where exactly would you put a floor jack. etc...
This would be a great help. The owners manual is no help at all.

 

So, take it to a shop with a drive-on lift.

 

Of course. That is what I meant by moving on to the next step of the maintenance but I thought I would see if there was a recapitulation of the experience of the video I linked in the post in this forum.

 

Hello, Rx350 4th gen forum members,

The subframe and the two lower control arms can be used for the front lift. The rear can be lifted at the rear cross member,

Draining and refill process was similar to the G automotive video, but I did not remove the wheel. I levelled the car using a Klein Tool


Levelling for 4th gen transaxle Lexus RX

added 3600 mL of WS fluid. Then from 35 C to 37.5 C I did recover 4000 mL. The transmission was serviced before judging by the drain stains and the overflow torx screw gasket being out of alignment. Also I would not wait to replace this screw gasket as in the video as the removal was not as fast as I wanted likely due to the fluid on the gloves.

Now on to the plugs!

 

Second oil change of Valvoline Restore and Protect. During this I discovered there are cutouts in the running boards.


Image shows the cutout, has the pinch welds (in the image it’s the jagged metal portion) behind the cutout.

To use the pinch weld behind the cutouts you need a puck on the jack or a jack with an installed lift. Surewerx model 352suv is an example of this.

Otherwise what I did was use the lift point on the sub frame reinforced point to lift and then place the jacks on the pinch weld. This is the way I did the tire rotation.

HTH.