If they were a model released in Japan, how do people have them here?

And any other enlightening things you might add. I had never heard of them till coming to this forum.

 

The Jdm Soarer Is A 2.5l Twin Turbo Engine And Comes In A 4spd Auto Or A 5spd Manual. Also It Came With A Digital Cluster

 

they come on a boat lol

 

Camron, you also forgot a Soarer can me the 4.0GT also . They rep for the SC400's too . Some Soarers also had better options than the SC, such as 4 wheel steering, or double din screen displays for climate and radio and such.

 

also had a rear wiper and the sonar mirrors and in later years had a back up camra

 

Same here, had never heard of the Soarer until I got here. Basically, the Soarer had a lot of electronics/gadgets that the SC didn't get, air suspension, a lot of stuff already mentioned. But one thing a lot of the Soarers didn't have that the SC did have was leather. Apparently most Soarers had cloth.

 

But do I understand right that they were never sold here, people are just importing them used into the country?

That would seem so prohibitively expensive.

 

it is expensive..VERY expensive. but thats why people do it...for having something no body else has. being unique is what its all about. only to us, it was known as the lexus sc300/400. everywhere else, was known as toyota soarer. much of the information can be found on intellexual.net. they basically have the whole history of the soarer

 

Both car models are made in Japan by Toyota. The Japanese model in the right-hand drive is called Soarer and the same car in left-hand drive for export to the USA is called Lexus. (It is said the LEXUS stands for Luxury EXport to USa). Therefore, the simple distiction is the location of steering wheel. There are number of other differences. The Lexus cars have an electronic analogue instrument panel, whilst the Soarers have electronic digital instrumentation. Generally, Soarers are more fully equipped cars: the Lexus never had the option of 2.5 T/T engine (only V8 and 3.0 non-turbo engines), TEMS suspension, EMV screen, not to mention the 4-wheel steering or active suspension. Shortly, features found in Lexus always have their equivalents in Soarers but not the other way round.

These features make them highly desirable and are therefore imported to the states whenever possible. Doing so is a costly process and time consuming.


Try searching next time.

 

^ Just tried saying that paragraph without taking a breath, and now Im gasping for air!

 

Thanks for the info. I've been familiar with Lexus since 1996 when my younger brother got an LS400. My wife has had an ES and RX, I just bought a 96 SC400.

I didn't find this place until I got my SC a few weeks ago. That when I started hearing the term Soarer.

I wonder if some countries got the Soarer as a Lexus model? When I was in London a few years ago I saw a Lexus that I'd never seen before. The guy came out and showed it to me and it was a turbo. I took pictures of it because I was so unfamiliar with a Lexus that was turbo.

He offered to let me drive it, (had known him for 3 minutes) but I declined. I didn't want to mess up this guys Lexus while I learned for the first time how to drive on the left.

 

There are getting to be lots of Soarers in Canada now, seen as the importation rules are different. Once the vehicle is 15 years old, all it needs is some paper work, an inspection, and in some cases, modifications to pass the inspection. Typically the modifications are related to the glass and lights, though most cars that have a North American equivalent usually are okay (Soarers pass w/o mod, Skylines don't). Things like the lack of EGR and stuff do not cause any problem at the inspection.

 

Yup. And FWIW, the price isn't too bad all things considered. It's a 15yo car but they generally come over with very low mileage and in excellent condition. Factory installed 1jz-gte and manual gearbox FTW. Mine just needed new headlights, a wiring mod to give it daytime running lights, and DOT rated tires. Unfortunately they use a different frequency range for radio stations over there so the stock radio is pretty useless.

 

Gttl Ftw!

I still find it funny how they want our cars and we want theirs...

 

How I wish the Aussie car import rules were like that. Basically parallel importing is illegal here for road use (e.g. I can't import an Aristo V300 because they sell the GS300 as a local model).

Not officially. Only the USA and Japan had the Soarer/SC, the rest are private imports into the countries (like my two were... and yes I have owned two of these unusual Lexus turbo cars ).